[rangibaby]

I think it's more pragmatic. What are you going to do with a stolen phone in a country where everyone already has the exact phone that they want? Bag snatching (ひったくり) used to be a regular enough occurrence that most people would know a friend it had happened to, but the occurrence of that has dropped too (90% since the year 2000 in Osaka [0]).

I would attribute the drop to the fact that most things people carry around now simply aren't worth stealing. Why risk jail over things that you can only flip for a few hundred bucks at most? There is almost no poor underclass here who would do that to survive, a side effect of Japan not being a desirable place for poor people to immigrate to.

[0] https://www.police.pref.osaka.jp/05bouhan/gaitohanzai/pdf/hi...

Heisei 12 = 2000 Heisei 26 = 2014

[Aelinsaar]

That's a good point, but it definitely relates to what I'm saying as well; you're just describing the benefit side of the cost:benefit analysis any criminal has to do. A lot of the cost in Japan, even for the pettiest of crimes, is that you either have to absolutely get away with it, or be branded a criminal.

All of what you said applies too, and it's all connected to the tighter community-oriented culture. There is after all, nothing impractical about choosing not to commit a petty crime, when as you say the benefit is minor and the risks are enormous.

[ekianjo]

I think you dont really understand the culture in Japan. There is no calculation going on. Stealing would not even cross 99.99% peoples mind in the first place.

[Aelinsaar]

I understand that, and am pointing out some of the conditioning behind that.