The demarcation between criminal and tort law is inherently economic; acts are prosecuted in a civil system up to the point that they reach "solvency limitation," that is, when it is no longer economically viable. Criminal acts bypass efficient market transactions which cause "enormous social costs," which is evident in acquisitive offences such as burglary as well as implicit markets such as the market for love that can manifest to rape. Tort law cannot effectively deter criminals from committing said acts since the optimal damages, measured through the Hand formula, would frequently exceed the criminal's ability to pay, which necessitates the existence of a public enforcement system. Bowles puts forward a convincing argument when he says that "from an economic perspective, some activities can only be deterred by using the criminal …show more content…
This again underlines the state's ability to redress inefficiencies in the criminal justice