Regulating Corporate Criminal Sanctions: Federal Guidelines and the Sentencing of Public Firms
研究了联邦量刑指南对上市公司刑事处罚的影响，发现指南实施后罚款和总处罚增加，但法官并未完全遵循指南规定，挑战了政治学中的基本态度模型。
Federal Sentencing Guidelines Governing Organizations purport to constrain judicial discretion over corporate criminal penalties. We investigate the effect on courts' sentencing decisions using pre‐ and post‐Guidelines data, including evidence on cases and penalties that the Guidelines do not completely control. We find that fines and total penalties are higher than they were previously. Evidence that fines increased more in Guidelines‐constrained cases than elsewhere suggests the effort to constrain judicial discretion has had a direct effect. Evidence of higher total penalties, even in cases not directly constrained by the Guidelines, suggests that judges may have cooperated with the policy of imposing higher fines and total sanctions, although not to the extent that the Guidelines prescribe. Our findings are inconsistent with the basic attitudinal model from the political science literature. We explore other forces that may be at work.