A fine or mulct is a penalty of money that a court of law or other authority decides has to be paid as punishment for a crime or other offense. The amount of a fine can be determined case by case, but it is often announced in advance.

Punishment, commonly, is the imposition of hated or unpleasant outcome upon a group or individual, meted out by an authority—in contexts ranging from child discipline to criminal law—as a response and deterrent to a particular action or behavior that is deemed undesirable or unacceptable. It is, however, possible to distinguish between various different understandings of what punishment is.