The Enforcement Game

Take fifty enforcement cases. Each is identified by which of five banks was involved and which of ten types of misconduct it concerns – misselling, say, or anti-money-laundering failures. Every case has been ranked by severity, from the most serious to the least, and every one of them is worth pursuing. You have the resources for fifteen.

Which fifteen do you choose?

Try it yourself. You’ll have fifteen minutes to choose your fifteen cases – enforcement committees don’t get unlimited deliberation time either – then see how your selections compare to four traditions in political philosophy: utilitarian, two versions of Rawlsian justice, and a lexicographic hybrid, each of which has, in its own way, been quietly running real enforcement committees for decades.