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Crime: Economics of, Different Paradigms

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Encyclopedia of Law and Economics

Definition

Economics of crime describes the attempt to explain rule-breaking behaviors based on the assumption that people make purposive choices under conditions of scarcity.

Economics of Crime: Different Paradigms

Economics of crime can be broadly defined as the attempt to explain rule-breaking behaviors based on the assumption that people make purposive choices under conditions of scarcity. People’s choice sets regularly contain both permissible and illicit choices. Illicit choices do not always constitute criminal acts in terms of violations of the criminal law. However, throughout this entry we use crime, illegal behavior, illicit choice, noncompliance, offense, and rule breaking as interchangeable terms for the infringement of formal (codified) rules. Economics of crime includes the analysis of economic crimeand white-collar crime such as corruption, patent infringements, or the violation of industrial safety laws, but it explicitly applies economic approaches to the study of...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Agribusiness Management, Institute of Agricultural and Nutritional Sciences, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Halle (Saale), Germany

    Sven Grüner & Norbert Hirschauer

Authors
  1. Sven Grüner
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  2. Norbert Hirschauer
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sven Grüner .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. MRE and University of Montpellier, Montpellier, France

    Alain Marciano

  2. Faculté d’Economie, Université de Montpellier and LAMETA-UMR CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Alain Marciano

  3. DiGSPES, University of Eastern Piedmont, Alessandria, Italy

    Giovanni Battista Ramello

  4. IEL, Torino, Italy

    Giovanni Battista Ramello

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Grüner, S., Hirschauer, N. (2019). Crime: Economics of, Different Paradigms. In: Marciano, A., Ramello, G.B. (eds) Encyclopedia of Law and Economics. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7753-2_695

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