Let the punishment fit the criminal: An experimental study

• Published in: Journal of economic behavior & organization Vol. 175; pp. 423 - 438
• Main Authors: Montag, Josef, Tremewan, James
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V 01.07.2020
• Subjects: Laboratory experiment; Monetary punishment; Non-monetary punishment; Subjective experience; Subjective experience; D03; K40; C91; Laboratory experiment; Monetary punishment; Non-monetary punishment; K14
• ISSN: 0167-2681; 1879-1751
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2018.07.011

•We find people condition punishment on the subjective experience of punishees.•This holds for monetary and non-monetary punishment.•Fines and non-monetary punishments differ in terms of punishee subjective experience.•Fines and non-monetary punishments do not differ as proportion of maximum punishment. We use a laboratory experiment to study the extent to which people tailor levels of punishment to the subjective experience of the person to receive that punishment, for both monetary and non-monetary sanctions. We find that subjects tend to apply higher fines to wealthier individuals. Additionally, subjects assign more repetitions of a tedious task to those with a lower willingness to pay to avoid it. We find no evidence that the distributions of monetary and non-monetary punishments are different when considered as proportions of the maximum possible punishment, but that this does not hold when non-monetary punishments are converted into monetary equivalents. This suggests that subjects do not have in mind a particular level of disutility from the punishment, but rather are guided by the sentencing possibilities.