IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/irlaec/v30y2010i3p253-264.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Punitive damages and the recklessness requirement with uninformed injurers

Author

Listed:
  • Bhole, Bharat
  • Wagner, Jeffrey

Abstract

Juries/courts sometimes award large punitive damages when the probability of detecting harm is high and take the recklessness of actions into account. However, economic theory suggests punitive damages should generally be low in such contexts. We argue that juries may be acting wisely. In particular, we show that: (a) even if the probability of conviction is one, punitive damages can raise welfare by aligning an injurer's perceived and actual benefit of care; and (b) a recklessness requirement for awarding punitive damages can be welfare-enhancing when there is uncertainty about the court's view of appropriate care.

Suggested Citation

  • Bhole, Bharat & Wagner, Jeffrey, 2010. "Punitive damages and the recklessness requirement with uninformed injurers," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 253-264, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:irlaec:v:30:y:2010:i:3:p:253-264
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0144-8188(10)00024-4
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Viscusi, W Kip, 2001. "The Challenge of Punitive Damages Mathematics," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 30(2), pages 313-350, Part I Ju.
    2. Mark Bagnoli & Ted Bergstrom, 2006. "Log-concave probability and its applications," Studies in Economic Theory, in: Charalambos D. Aliprantis & Rosa L. Matzkin & Daniel L. McFadden & James C. Moore & Nicholas C. Yann (ed.), Rationality and Equilibrium, pages 217-241, Springer.
    3. Rabah Amir, 2005. "Supermodularity and Complementarity in Economics: An Elementary Survey," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 71(3), pages 636-660, January.
    4. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2000. "On the joint use of liability and safety regulation," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 371-382, September.
    5. Rabah Amir, 2005. "Supermodularity and Complementarity in Economics: An Elementary Survey," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 71(3), pages 636-660, January.
    6. Chu, C.Y. Cyrus & Huang, Chen-Ying, 2004. "On the definition and efficiency of punitive damages," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 241-254, June.
    7. Bebchuk, Lucian Arye & Kaplow, Louis, 1992. "Optimal Sanctions When Individuals Are Imperfectly Informed about the Probability of Apprehension," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 21(2), pages 365-370, June.
    8. Joshua C. Teitelbaum, 2007. "A Unilateral Accident Model under Ambiguity," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(2), pages 431-477, June.
    9. Steven Shavell, 1984. "A Model of the Optimal Use of Liability and Safety Regulation," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(2), pages 271-280, Summer.
    10. Craswell, Richard & Calfee, John E, 1986. "Deterrence and Uncertain Legal Standards," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 2(2), pages 279-303, Fall.
    11. Sunstein, Cass R & Schkade, David A & Kahneman, Daniel, 2000. "Do People Want Optimal Deterrence?," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 29(1), pages 237-253, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Alexander Petre & Jeffrey Wagner, 2013. "Green Consumption under Misperceived Prices: An Application to Active Transportation," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 80(1), pages 187-204, July.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gérard Mondello, 2013. "Ambiguous Beliefs on Damages and Civil Liability Theories"," Post-Print halshs-00929948, HAL.
    2. Gérard Mondello, 2015. "Civil liability, Knight's UnCertainty and non-diCtatorial regUlator Documents de travail GREDEG GREDEG Working Papers Series," Working Papers hal-01251437, HAL.
    3. Mondello, Gérard, 2012. "La responsabilité environnementale des prêteurs : difficultés juridiques et ensemble des possibles," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 88(2), pages 257-278, Juin.
    4. Gérard Mondello, 2012. "The Equivalence of Strict Liability and Negligence Rule: A " Trompe l'œil " Perspective," Post-Print hal-00727223, HAL.
    5. Bhole, Bharat, 2007. "Due-care standards in a market setting with legal error," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 154-169.
    6. Rota-Graziosi, Grégoire, 2019. "The supermodularity of the tax competition game," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 25-35.
    7. Innes, Robert, 2004. "Enforcement costs, optimal sanctions, and the choice between ex-post liability and ex-ante regulation," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 29-48, March.
    8. Dhammika Dharmapala & Sandra A. Hoffmann, 2005. "Bilateral Accidents with Intrinsically Interdependent Costs of Precaution," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(1), pages 239-272, January.
    9. Donatella Porrini, 2005. "Environmental Policies Choice as an Issue of Informational Efficiency," Chapters, in: Jürgen G. Backhaus (ed.), The Elgar Companion to Law and Economics, Second Edition, chapter 23, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    10. Anja Olbrich, 2008. "The optimal negligence standard in health care under supply-side cost sharing," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 8(2), pages 73-85, June.
    11. Florian Baumann & Tim Friehe & Alexander Rasch, 2018. "Product Liability in Markets for Vertically Differentiated Products," American Law and Economics Review, American Law and Economics Association, vol. 20(1), pages 46-81.
    12. Guiseppe Dari Mattiaci & F. Parisi, 2003. "The Economics of Tort Law: A Précis," Working Papers 03-13, Utrecht School of Economics.
    13. Maria Arvaniti & Chandra K. Krishnamurthy & Anne-Sophie Crépin, 2019. "Time-consistent resource management with regime shifts," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 19/329, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    14. Marion Desquilbet & Sylvaine Poret, 2014. "How do GM/non GM coexistence regulations affect markets and welfare?," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 37(1), pages 51-82, February.
    15. Drewianka, Scott, 2006. "A generalized model of commitment," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 52(3), pages 233-251, December.
    16. Camacho, Carmen & Kamihigashi, Takashi & Sağlam, Çağrı, 2018. "Robust comparative statics for non-monotone shocks in large aggregative games," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 174(C), pages 288-299.
    17. Guido Tabellini, 2007. "The Scope of Cooperation: Norms and Incentives," Levine's Working Paper Archive 321307000000000866, David K. Levine.
    18. Takashi Kamihigashi & Kerim Keskin & Çağrı Sağlam, 2021. "Organizational refinements of Nash equilibrium," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 91(3), pages 289-312, October.
    19. Suurmond, Guido, 2007. "The effects of the enforcement strategy," MPRA Paper 21142, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Natalia Lazzati, 2013. "Comparison of equilibrium actions and payoffs across players in games of strategic complements," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 54(3), pages 777-788, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:irlaec:v:30:y:2010:i:3:p:253-264. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/irle .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.