The Impact of Punishment Postponement on the Evolution of Honest Behavior

Interactions between honest and dishonest people are inevitable in society. Increasing crime rates raise concern among people and society leaders. A pressing and aware issue for more and more people is the importance of applying sanctions for criminal offenses on time. Postponing or delaying the punishment entails not only the increase of the criminal level and the ineffectiveness of the measures taken by the leaders of the society, but also a decrease in the level of people's trust in the act of justice. In the present paper we propose to study the impact of punishment postponement on the probability of punishment and how it can influence the level of honest/dishonest individuals in society. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the importance of timely sanctions for discouraging dishonest behavior. Our results may explain how punishment delay influences the mechanisms based on individual punishment.