So they're saying that incentives actually matter. Huh. Actually, I think this needs to be qualified. When penalties are pushed so high that the criminal quick

So they're saying that incentives actually matter. Huh. Actually, I think this needs to be qualified. When penalties are pushed so high that the criminal quickly reaches a penalty plateau, then they "in for a penny, in for a pound": if they're willing to commit the smaller crimes, it quickly escalates to larger ones. So if the penalty for kidnapping is death, then you may as well kill the kid to eliminate witnesses; the murder charge won't hurt you any further. And if you're killing one person, you may as well kill a whole roomful: the first is expensive, the rest are free.