When is it efficient to treat juvenile offenders more leniently than adult offenders?

What is it about?

Typically, young offenders are less likely to be incarcerated than adult offenders. Moreover, conditions in juvenile detention centers are better than adult prisons. Given that empirical evidence suggests that punishment acts as effectively as a deterrent for young offenders as it does for adults, the efficiency of this leniency should be investigated. This study does this by modeling the finding of previous empirical studies that juvenile detention reduces human capital acquisition. This lowers the deterrent effects of prison for adults who were incarcerated as juveniles. Thus, it may be inefficient to treat juvenile offenders as harshly as adult offenders.

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Why is it important?

Per inmate, society spends significantly more detaining juveniles than adults. Moreover, those incarcerated as juveniles are more likely to commit crimes as adults. Understanding the relationship is important to determine if the higher incarceration expenditures for juveniles are justified and if it is possible to reduce criminal acts later in life.