Econometric modeling shifted death-penalty research and produced contested deterrence claims

Evidence

Prior to the 1970s, research on the deterrent effect of the death penalty was conducted mainly by behavioral scientists and criminologists. More recently, empirical arguments regarding the death penalty have centered mainly on the econometric model of deterrent effects. In the inaugural application of this method, the economist Isaac Ehrlich (1975) studied murder rates as a function of the probability of being caught, convicted, and executed; income and employment; and expenditures in law enforcement. … He concluded from his economic analysis that each execution spares several lives. However, his research came under heavy fire on conceptual and methodological grounds (Fox & Radelet, 1989). — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1950

Categorization

• SEED: Angle: how a single contested econometric study (Ehrlich 1975, each execution spares several lives) anchored decades of policy argument, showing how one number becomes a political fulcrum.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm…, 1950