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by lazide 632 days ago
Opportunity cost and cost of consequences are far from zero.

Most criminals clear less than they would working minimum wage.

It only appears to approach infinity if you ignore reality and consequences, which is often how criminals think. But it is not the actual truth, eh?
2 comments
Forgeties79 630 days ago
>Most criminals clear less than they would working minimum wage.

I know people hate "Source?" as a reply but I think this claim really needs a source.

There is also the assumption that everyone has access to a job, which depending on where you are and what you're background is (we are very hostile to people with disabilities, physical "deformities" that people find unpleasant to look at, felony convictions, etc.) may or may not be true. A lot of folks turn to theft out of desperation.

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lazide 627 days ago
It depends on what you mean by crime, income, etc. and what factors you consider - but as you note, people often start out desperate, and then escalate because crime doesn’t really solve the desperation. Some crimes do produce good income, relative to the same effort in a legal occupation, but most don’t. And in many (but not all cases) the people involved can’t actually get equivalent legal work. So it is difficult to compare.

However, [https://journalistsresource.org/economics/illegal-income-cri...] and [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004723522...]

Are interesting reading.

For the most part, crime doesn’t pay when you add all the costs involved. Society works very hard to make it that way.

Unless you’re pimping, higher up in organized crime, etc.

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night862 632 days ago
Not at all, no petty theft is deterred by the criminal thinking, “oh no, what if it’s locked!”

They aren’t making a wage at all. They are doing something else.

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lazide 627 days ago
They are spending time trying to get money by stealing and fencing things.

If they can’t turn around and sell/fence it for much, that definitely deters the ‘business model’.

If someone is doing this for 12 hours/day and clearing $100/day (or less) all said and done, that limits who and where that will happen.

If they are clearing $2000/day, that expands the pool a lot eh?

You can definitely see it in areas with predominantly iPhones as phone theft just isn’t a thing since Apple did their remote bricking thing.

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