Citation

Chu CYC, Hu S, Huang T. Int. Rev. Law Econ. 2000; 20(1): 127-140.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2000, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/S0144-8188(00)00024-7

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

That repeat offenders are punished more severely than first-time offenders is a generally accepted practice of almost all penal codes or sentencing guidelines. So far, what has been established in the literature is that sometimes it is better to penalize repeat offenders more severely than first-time offenders. This qualified result seems to be incompatible with the unqualified practices followed in most penal codes. The contribution of this article is to point out why the optimal-deterrence framework adopted in the previous literature cannot generate an unqualified result and to provide an unconditional justification for the practice of punishing repeat offenders more severely, based on an argument that is different from those used in the recent literature.