Boxed in: Economists and benefits from crime

Abstract

In cost-benefit (welfare) analyses of crime, economists have been uncertain whether to treat criminals' gains as relevant benefits. Several approaches to this issue have been tried, only some of them economic. Jeff Lewin and William Trumbull have offered another argument for excluding such benefits. 1 This rejoinder to them makes three points. First, recasting the problem in an Edgeworth box identifies one source of economists' confusion. Second, Gordon Tullock years ago solved the problem addressed by Lewin and Trumbull. Tullock's analysis is superior, finally, as it uses an existing model already familiar to economists.