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Comment by ethbr1 | Hacker News Reader

>> One set of explanations suggests that it’s precisely the lack of financial resources that causes crime. [...] Or, poorer people face greater strains

>> [or there's a] third variable correlated with both income and crime. For example, higher IQ or greater conscientiousness

Or... the consequences of being prosecuted for crime are heavily weighted towards taking away things you have: freedom, luxury, wealth.

If you don't have any of those things, because you're poor, the relative consequences for getting caught decrease.

Consequently, there's less of a disincentive to avoid crime, especially if it offers you a way to get ahead.

Rich people have a lot that can be taken by the state in retaliation. Poor people, notsomuch.

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I think the idea that relatively rich people have more to lose is important.

Age is also a factor. I worked retail in high school and then office jobs the rest of my life. When I worked retail, half the teen males I worked with were stealing merchandise from the store we worked at. In my 20 years of office work, with all the electronic surveillance of our behavior, I have encountered maybe 2 person I worked with that was crime adjacent.

If you are a 17 year old male making $5/hr hourly in precarious employment, then stealing a $500 electronic device is an interesting proposition, it's also an 80x return.

If you are a married adult supporting your family making $200k in steady employment, then stealing some office equipment or falsifying invoices is a lot riskier of a proposition, and for what?

You’d be surprised how many techies making $200k a year will engage in insider trading. The first few cases I heard about were just shocking, because they are very likely to get caught, and their lives ruined.

I've seen assertions like this before but I think it still falls into the opportunity set theory.

The frequency that someone making $200k in a tech firm finds out information that is material and that can give them a return worth risking $200k job, is rather low. Especially in comparison to the daily opportunity to commit crimes on the scale of $100-1000 if you are making minimum wage. So the frequency of temptation is lower the higher your income, I would argue.

>You’d be surprised how many techies making $200k a year will engage in insider trading

Well, how many? The US is a big country, so you're going to be able to come up with dozens of cases even if the base rate is minuscule.

I was just surprised about the number of actual cases I was aware of. It is anecdotal, but I otherwise would not thought it was common enough to know of one incident, let alone multiple ones.

I guess the people who do this simply don’t know better, and are used to developing world stock markets where the rules are very different from here. The insider trading training corps push is actually useful for informing people how different it is here.

Heard a very similar argument around suicide. People with more education and wealth seem to commit suicide greater than those without. So much of State, so much to lose, so much invested, it's like having the rug pulled out from under you I guess.

Same argument for why immigrants tend to commit less crime.

Being here is the opportunity of a lifetime and risking it is rarely worthwhile.

Isn't this rejected by the study. If poor people have less to lose, then why doesn't the data show that increasing their wealth reduces their crime rate? If they are awarded more money, then they have more to lose, yet their rate is crime forward but decrease according to this study, no?

Because they didn't invest time and effort in the means to acquire that wealth, which is the thing most wealthy people are truly afraid to lose.

Professional licensing (e.g. MD), social network and reputation, political power.

Giving someone even a lot of cash doesn't tie them to "the system" in the way that those things do.

It is kind of ironic how people don't understand how deterrence works. They think being tough on crime means more deterrence, but realistically those people leave prison one day, with less to lose and the deterrence effect disappears for good.

Agreed. Convicts having difficulty finding solid jobs seems... words fail me idiotic.

It's absolutely ridiculous, and a complete byproduct of a vengeful society. It is rare that a politician can run on a platform that is in favor of prison reform. They will be branded as soft on crime. Every politician has to be tough on crime, tough on evil doers, and citizens expect harsh punishments. It's almost like a vicarious executioner. Rehabilitation is what we need more than anything, not more prisons, not longer jail sentences, rehabilitation.

Or leaving prison with existing or new substance abuse problems. Prison is the only environment that can realistic force treatment and abstinence. The lack of jobs, job training, substance abuse problems, and often burnt bridges with friends and family means they are in a bus to some east or west coast city after they get out, with nowhere to stay.

Also people misunderstand how deterrence works. In that if you double the sentence people don't fear it twice as much.

Especially when conviction rates are as low as they are, "getting caught is something that happens it other people, it could never happen to me, I'm too smart"

I've read studies that suggest that high detection/conviction rates and relatively mild punishments is the ideal.

That still falls under the first set.

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