Turning crack dealers into chief executives | Hacker News Reader

Turning crack dealers into chief executives

news.bbc.co.uk

25 pointsnoor42016 comments

I remember watching a PBS program in the early 90's with a girl from the 'hood saying essentially the same thing. Her take was that the dealers on the street weren't going to stop just because the cops/city government wanted them to, but if you could find a way for them to take the money they made and channel it into legal businesses, most of them would rather do that because they knew what their life expectancy was otherwise.

In her words "they're already businessmen. They know how to make money and talk to people but everybody looks down on them for what they do." I thought it was a very insightful comment even back then.

The thing that drove it home for me was when driving through the projects some years later, I saw a well-dressed (complete with walking stick!) elderly man selling heroin on the street. No way you're just going to get people to stop unless you show them an alternative.

It's funny this comes at a time when business leaders are increasingly seen as dishonest and irresponsible profit-seekers. I'm thinking of the bankers seem to try reap profits from the bailout just like they did from the bubble.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Thain#Obama_administration

There is also this other fashionable topic, psychopaths in management:

http://www.management-issues.com/2006/8/24/research/beware-t...

http://www.aim.com.au/DisplayStory.asp?ID=566

(But to be honest, having read the article, turning crack dealers into entrepreneurs sounds like a great idea.)

Crack dealers are entrepreneurs. I might have some concern about being a VC for one of their startups, however.

They enter their business training already well-trained in hiding profits, exterminating rivals, and corrupting officials. Will it be "working for you" to have them rise to the top of businesses such as banking? Or will that just leave us with the current status quo?

Crack dealers are entrepreneurs.

Most crack dealers work in large organizations with only one or a few entrepreneurs at the top. Does working at Microsoft or Google make one an entrepreneur?

As the article said:

Felipe Dias is one of the convicts Catherine plans to redirect into a legitimate enterprise.

He was once a lieutenant of the Mexican Mafia gang and made tens of thousands of dollars a month importing drugs and selling firearms and stolen cars.

A lieutenant is not a founder.

It is certainly harder to become a lieutenant of a drug cartel then becoming an executive at a corporation.

What's your metric? Are you basing that on direct experience with both, or some kind of statistics?

Direct Experience.

Can you elaborate? Unfortunately for some reason there aren't that many firsthand accounts of what is required to become a lieutenant in a drug cartel. If you can find time to write about your experiences, it would be a substantial contribution to the public discourse.

And how many of our most successful hacker/entrepreneurs are former computer criminals?

I'm not just talking about breaking into the high school's web server -- I'm talking serious scam artistry. I know several Romanian hackers for whom this was a rite of passage while growing up. They all have respectable jobs at huge software firms now, often in charge of security or financial apps.

As mentioned in one of the later chapters in Freakonomics, at least some crack gangs do model traditional structures in corporate America, down to the point of detailed bookkeeping and using titles such as regional manager and CEO.

Related: Steven Levitt's TED talk, "Why do crack dealers still live with their moms?" shows some real world stats about drug dealers.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/steven_levitt_analyzes_cr...

As for the BBC article, I found it inspirational that it referenced The Wire and Stringer Bell's attempted self-transformation. It gives me hope for a different outcome in real life than Bell's fate in the series.

Like we need more ruthless, immoral executives. Not saying they don't deserve a chance, but somehow I still wouldn't expect integrity and respect towards other human beings to be high among their perks.

From the looks of the teacher, I have a sneaking suspicion there are other reasons for the inmates taking this class.

No self-respecting crack dealer is going to settle for $500K/year!

Dup. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=482106

Turning crack dealers into chief executives (bbc.co.uk)

4 points by RiderOfGiraffes 22 hours ago | 1 comment

Buy them a nice suit?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com