The John M. Olin Center
Paper Abstract
357. Henrik Lando and Steven Shavell, The Advantage of Focusing Law Enforcement Effort, 03/2002; subsequently published in International Review of Law and Economics, Vol. 24, Issue 2 (2004), 209-218..
Abstract: It is shown in this paper that there may exist an intrinsic advantage in focusing law enforcement effort on a subgroup of possible violators of law, rather than applying law enforcement effort uniformly over the relevant population of potential violators. For example, it might be desirable for the tax audit rate to be higher for individuals whose names begin with the letters A-M than for those whose names begin with N-Z. This may be desirable even though, as is assumed, the frequency of violations does not differ between subgroups.