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by pjc50 5 days ago
> people willing to damage infrastructure for everyone else

Cable theft is particularly destructive because it's so value-destroying. $100k of cable destroyed for a maximum profit of $1k.

Or in this particularly egregious UK case, a multimillion pound artwork destroyed for £1,500 scrap value: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2009/may/17/henry-m...

I also think that stereotypes make people underestimate rural crime. There may not be a lot of people, but the per capita crime rate can be just as high as urban areas, and the under-reporting issues can be worse. Lots of invisible drug trafficing or manufacture/growing. Lots of thefts of ag equipment. Even the occasional theft of livestock, a crime from pre-history.

Then there's the both essential and illegal use of immigrants who have been imported for the purpose without work permits and may be held in coercive and unpleasant conditions.
4 comments
expedition32 5 days ago
The Netherlands had a lot of problems with people stealing copper lines. Eventually the government made a deal with scrapyards- they were traditionally run by somewhat shady people.
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wildzzz 3 days ago
We had an antenna range built inside of a shipping container. We had some pretty fancy copper cladding that had some pricey dielectric inside of it. Somehow, a copper thief found it and stole all of the cladding. That stuff was probably worth 1000x its copper scrap value. I'm sure the thief was expecting to find some equipment to pawn but instead opened up a treasure chest.
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stronglikedan 5 days ago
> a multimillion pound artwork destroyed for £1,500 scrap value

I think a more apt comparison would be the retail value of the metal compared to the scrap value, since the "multimillion" is more of a subjective artistic value. Egregious nonetheless.

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CaptainZapp 5 days ago
Sure, art is subjective to some extent. But reducing the value of a Henry Moore piece to the value of the material is, well, not very insightful.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Moore

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pixl97 5 days ago
Eh, retail value of the metal doesn't include the hours in shaping it, transporting and mounting it. It's still hundreds of thousands in value versus $1500 scrap.
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picofarad 5 days ago
Didn't we use to hang cattle rustlers?
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