Does Death Penalty Save Lives? A New Debate

By ADAM LIPTAK
Published: November 18, 2007
NY Times

For the first time in a generation, the question of whether the death penalty deters murders has captured the attention of scholars in law and economics, setting off an intense new debate about one of the central justifications for capital punishment.

According to roughly a dozen recent studies, executions save lives. For each inmate put to death, the studies say, 3 to 18 murders are prevented.

The effect is most pronounced, according to some studies, in Texas and other states that execute condemned inmates relatively often and relatively quickly.

The studies, performed by economists in the past decade, compare the number of executions in different jurisdictions with homicide rates over time — while trying to eliminate the effects of crime rates, conviction rates and other factors — and say that murder rates tend to fall as executions rise. One influential study looked at 3,054 counties over two decades.

“I personally am opposed to the death penalty,” said H. Naci Mocan, an economist at Louisiana State University and an author of a study finding that each execution saves five lives. “But my research shows that there is a deterrent effect.”

The studies have been the subject of sharp criticism, much of it from legal scholars who say that the theories of economists do not apply to the violent world of crime and punishment. Critics of the studies say they are based on faulty premises, insufficient data and flawed methodologies.

The rest here

I saw this article in the NY Times over the weekend and thought it would be of interest. The first time I remember thinking about the issue of the death penalty was in sixth or seventh grade, where my english teacher divided us into two camps: for and against the death penalty. I was put into the "against" category, even though all of us were pretty ambivalent about the issue and no one particularly wanted to be against. This summer I was tracking the case of Kenneth Foster, who was going to be executed in Texas (where I'm from), for being a sort of "accomplice" to a murder when what he actually did was sit in the back of the car. His sentence was commuted to life. While I followed his case I researched the death penalty a little bit and it REALLY surprised me that the electric chair was still used in some states (or at least allowed to be in use), and so was hanging. I thought those forms of execution were archaic and had gone out of fashion, and it was really jarring to think they were still utilized.

Anyway, there you have it. I don't really know if it's helpful to have economists debate over this issue: I mean, people aren't currency, and I have a feeling that any of these studies must be deeply flawed.