Myths and Misunderstandings in White-Collar Crime

Myths and Misunderstandings in White-Collar Crime uses real-world examples to explore the pathologies that hamper our ability to understand and redress white-collar crime. The book argues that misinterpretations about federal white-collar crime impede its lawmaking, enforcement, and discourse, leading it to be overcriminalized and underenforced. Many of these pathologies can be traced to the federal code's failure to subdivide white-collar crimes by degrees of severity, and by the legislature's outsourcing of criminal lawmaking to other institutions. With deep knowledge of the federal code and theories of institutional design and behavioral psychology at her disposal, Miriam Baer offers a step-by-step framework for redressing these problems by paying greater attention to how we write, frame, and lay out our federal criminal code. A clearer, subdivided criminal code, she argues, paves the way for more informed and productive deliberation, and fewer myths and misunderstandings.

• Identifies and explains pathologies of white-collar crime in regard to lawmaking, enforcement, and data-collection and discourse
• Analyzes real-world prosecutions and scandals, including Varsity Blues, the Financial Crisis, and many others
• Draws on a wide array of literatures such as behavioral psychology, deterrence theory, and institutional design