[declan_roberts]

We really need to bring back corporal punishment, both for petty crimes and white collar crimes. The prison sentences don't make sense for the petty crimes, and the fines don't make sense for the white collar crimes.

We need to legalize public caning and the stocks.

[tancop]

we dont need new punishments, the system is just backwards. for things like shoplifting and vandalism it should be double or triple damages with no prison. corporate fraud, cartels, pollution, big time tax evasion has to come with 20+ year sentences and fines based on your income like a traffic violation in norway. flat fines just dont work when the criminal is rich.

in general we should be a lot more strict on sexual crimes (sa, trafficking, child abuse but not voluntary prostitution) and white collar/economic ones including wage theft, but less strict on drugs and property. drug possession and non commercial digital piracy should be decriminalized.

violent crimes are mostly in the right place, the big problem there is racist prosecutors and ineffective anti gang programs not the laws themselves but we need to remove death penalty/life without parole everywhere they still exist.

the point is we need a rebalance not a whole new untested mechanic.

[gruez]

>for things like shoplifting and vandalism it should be double or triple damages with no prison

What do you think the chances of being caught shoplifting is? If it's less than 50-33%, then you have the same problem as the OP where it makes sense to shoplift.

[scottlamb]

> What do you think the chances of being caught shoplifting is? If it's less than 50-33%, then you have the same problem as the OP where it makes sense to shoplift.

Don't we already? Police and DAs at least here in California are not serious about punishing shoplifters AFAICT. I hear people say this is specifically because of the 2014 Proposition 47 (raising the threshold for felony theft from $400 to $950). Not sure that's true (misdemeanor theft can still be punished by up to six months of jail time and/or up to a $1,000 fine, and California's current thresholds are similar to other states) but there was a federal mandate to address prison overcrowding, and California chose to do that by not having as many prisoners instead of building a ton more prisons. Prop 47, and perhaps some policy changes made with far less fanfare, were intended to achieve that.

There's still more deterrent for misdemeanor shoplifting than for nationwide egg price-fixing though!

[AngryData]

Police don't go for small crimes because they don't have the standing for them and courts to extort and abuse people over them and that is how they get bonuses and abusive actions ignored. It is a perverse incentive to extort the most vulnerable on the harshest charges possible while ignoring any more difficult to prove crimes and petty crimes.

[gruez]

>Don't we already?

So clearly we should... make it even more lenient? That's what OP was implying.

[scottlamb]

Well, I qualified with "here in California", and I don't know if that's where tancop lives.

I think the current situation is not great, but I'd want to fix it by investigating why we're seemingly unable/unwilling to impose the punishment currently on the books. I think it would be plenty if we did—to me, more than six months jail time for stealing <$950 would be excessive. We could increase the fines and decrease / take away the jail option, but does it matter? It's not happening anyway.

[mvdtnz]

And do you think the situation in California is a good situation?

[gopher_space]

The general public isn’t that relentlessly amoral.

[ksbd-pls-finish]

>in general we should be a lot more strict on sexual crimes (sa, trafficking, child abuse but not voluntary prostitution) and white collar/economic ones including wage theft, but less strict on drugs and property. drug possession and non commercial digital piracy should be decriminalized.

Why? I mean, do you have a specific scientific research in mind, or is it something you feel is right?

I mean, it makes sense to me, mostly, but "we should" presented without any evidence irks me a bit.

[atmavatar]

To start with, the war on drugs was initiated by Nixon as a way to target political enemies (hippies and non-whites).

[CrimsonCape]

Imagine if small movie theaters could just show films at their own whim.

You could have small theaters springing up everywhere. I'm sure there's a boot ready and waiting to smash down this from happening.

[john_strinlai]

>the fines don't make sense for the white collar crimes.

why do we need to jump to caning instead of increasing the fines to something more than an operating expense?

in this case, if the fine was 1000x the profits instead of the other way around, the problem would be solved, right?

[bs7280]

Executives will be more afraid of being sent to prison for criminal charges, than having someone else's money get spent on fines. We can do both - increase the fines and set a precedent of arresting executives when their company does criminal things.

[atmavatar]

In a large enough organization with many layers to it, it very well may be that executives were neither involved nor aware of criminal wrongdoing, and even when they are, you'll never find sufficient evidence to charge them. That's largely the point behind performing criminal acts as a business and why there's so much white-collar crime.

At least if you set fines to a level that such crimes are rarely if ever profitable, you can both remove the incentive for the organization to commit them as well as introduce a passive internal mechanism to prevent them in the first place.

[duped]

In this case they have literal correspondence between the CEOs.

[john_strinlai]

sure, prison time for some criminal stuff is cool too.

i am more pushing back against the call for corporal punishment like caning

[jachee]

What if I told you that prison is also corporal punishment?

[john_strinlai]

i tried to be more specific with the “like caning” part

[jackb4040]

I have no moral objection, but it would just change the composition of CEOs as a group. Instead of just selecting for sociopaths, we'd start selecting for sociopaths with high pain tolerance.

[weaksauce]

In any other crime you get caught doing you do not get the benefits of the ill gotten gains. why should this be any different?

[john_strinlai]

i am saying the fine should exceed the ill gotten gains. so, they would not get the benefits

[weaksauce]

yeah, I'm in agreement with you. other crimes the ill gotten gains are taken back and additional penalties are levied against the perpetrator. just saying why should these crimes be treated any different?

[john_strinlai]

i think i read your comment in defense mode, and interpreted it incorrectly!

[vondur]

In theory there will be some class action lawsuits that will come about from this now that this report is public. Those can get very expensive.

[Supermancho]

> the problem would be solved, right?

Corporal punishment is laughable outright, but that's masking the issue. Punishing corporations does not discourage the participants directly. The behavior will not change.

[forshaper]

And rotten tomato pelting would probably helpfully lower the rate of people turning their resentments into content.

[the__alchemist]

Alternatively: (As stated in the other replies) jail execs.

[Henchman21]

Along with this we need the revocation of corporate charters and the liquidation of all assets belonging to the owners of any corp that is dissolved in this manner. The penalty for fucking over the public in general should be a lifetime of poverty.

[devilbunny]

The owners of corporations are mostly pension funds and the like.

[mlsu]

Arguably that is worse. If a criminal misuses his own resources to commit crimes and then you take that away from them, it only affects him.

The companies should be liquidated still. That would put the incentives in the correct order.

[devilbunny]

> If a criminal misuses his own resources to commit crimes and then you take that away from them, it only affects him.

There is certainly a case to be made here for “if it seems too good to be true…”, but realistically we are not going to impoverish the retired teachers of X state because X state chose poorly.

[zie]

Sort of True-ish. There are lots of different kinds of ownership. Ownership with little to no say in how things are run to ownership with basically all the control.

If you are an owner with all the control, i.e. you are on the board or in corporate leadership(CEO/CFO/etc), then hey guess what,there is a really great cell here at the local prison just waiting for you, depending on how involved you were.

If you are an owner with little to no control, i.e. most shareholders that just vote for the board, etc. The assets would get liquidated, bond/debt holders would get paid back, and then anything left over would go to these shareholders.

This would incentivize shareholders to care more about what they are owning, this is a good thing. Even if it's pension funds and individual retirement accounts. This would get sorted pretty quickly as soon as the new normal is known and adjusted for.

SpaceX for example just went public, but if you read the docs, the control was not given to the public. Elon Musk 100% controls SpaceX still. Even if every public shareholder unanimously agrees against Elon Musk, guess what happens? Elon Musk still gets his way.

I don't know what the parent comment was thinking, but to my mind, the ones with the most control get the worst of the consequences. So Pension Funds/etc that hold little to no control would get paid out before those with more control.

[jackb4040]

This whole thread is a fascinating exercise. I'm watching HN derive Lenin's "What is to be Done?" from first principles.

[Henchman21]

I think to state it succinctly, the thing I was thinking was: "the people that make the bad decisions should bear the consequences".

[zie]

That generally turns out to be the same thing as me, just said more succinctly. I agree with your thinking.

[nitwit005]

Good. It's purely positive if they take losses from investing in companies engaging in fraud, as it'll encourage them not to do that.

[unethical_ban]

Yet another issue with the modern US iteration of capitalism. The intentional design of the US stock market for people to depend on it for retirement, instead of getting enough wages to save their money risk-free or with government benefits.

Pushing 401k and IRA, making it so that's the only viable way (other than having a high-6-digit wage) to live comfortably in retirement, is a detriment to a healthy society.

[lesuorac]

What version of capitalism wouldn't have the problem of risky investments paying out more than safe ones?

The people with better ROI are just going to outbid the ones with a worse ROI for their retirement spending so if you just invest it into T-Bills you'll do worse than inflation.

[unethical_ban]

I'd say a better version is one where the average citizen does not have to *rely* on a boom-bust, unregulated financial system to secure their ability to survive in retirement. Through tax, fiscal and monetary policy it would be better if people could rely on government services and normal wages to get through their elder years.

[gustavus]

We have Social Security though and that doesn't seem to be working much better.

[devilbunny]

Yeah, before capitalism you just worked until you died, or your children took care of you. That’s still an option, but you must have kids and they must like you.

[lesuorac]

I didn't check, but I don't think the corporate charter for this companies allows for fraud.

Not sure what the penalty for doing things you weren't incorporated for but seems reasonable for me that the liability doesn't rest with the corporation.

[skeeter2020]

except that was never used against the powerful and wealthy, just the same poor who pay the price today.

[geodel]

I'll start this punishment from elementary schools onwards. Early punishment will prevent later crimes.

[Ekaros]

Only effective way to protect victims from bullies is to imprison the bullies. No excuses. In todays 24/7 surveillance sufficient evidence should be reachable.