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Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

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61–70 of 91 posts

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#61
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The amount being stolen is high enough to be debilating for businesses but low enough not to justify an insurance claim?

Insurance money doesn't come from nowhere, it comes from the people who are paying for a policy. If everybody is losing to the thieves then all insurance is gonna do is convert the lump sum losses into a monthly payment.

This isn't true. Insurance companies make money from float too which allows them to run on a loss when only comparing premiums to claims.

It should be obvious that insurance serves as financial benefit for the insured or else the insurance industry would have collapsed a long time ago.

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#62

HN probably won’t like this, but facial recognition might be solution here. When a thief steals something from a shop or damages property window, the cashiers can’t (and shouldn’t) try to stop them. But they can get a video recording of the evidence. If they upload the recording to a shared database, other security cameras can recognize the criminal and match them with other crimes. In theory, if someone accidentally…

Implementing SkyNet(TM) isn't going to solve the fact that there is no political will to prosecute petty property crime.

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#63
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CVS alone has paid $100 million in wage theft settlements https://violationtracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/cvs-health A single walgreens theft recently resulted in hundreds of news reports… walgreens’ multi-million wage theft settlement? outrageously less coverage

Ok... your point?

that retail theft is over-reported and has serious social implications that are outsized for the scale of theft

just look at some of the comments here, people calling for increased prosecution of the poor (including jail time) without a mention of the wider scale deeds of the companies most commonly being stolen from

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#64
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prosecuting petty crime with a (legitimate, funded, and measured effectiveness) diversion path for anyone who isn’t an egregious reoffender. “Stop! Or I’ll say stop again!” Is not a successful strategy. Three strikes is excessively punitive, but neither does allowing rampant crime to continue unabated.

"Three strikes is excessively punitive" Maybe. It can be pretty easy to commit crimes, but in general felonies are tougher to be accidental (although not impossible). The three strikes law has to do with felonies. If 2 stints in prison haven't deterred them from committing serious crimes, then it's likely they won't change (although a side note is that the current system could be enhanced in terms of rehabilitation e…

>If 2 stints in prison haven't deterred them from committing serious crimes

You are so close here. Maybe if the 2 stints in prison haven't deterred their crime it means that punishment isn't much of a deterrent and therefore we shouldn't blame decreased punishment for an increase in crime.

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do they? More crimes means a lower solved crime rate, which looks reflects poorly on the city's leadership.

Police unions are frequently feuding with city leadership. As an example, the NYPD doxxed DiBlasio's daughter in revenge for his position on the George Floyd murder: https://www.newsweek.com/nypd-sergeants-benevolent-associati... Overstating/cherrypicking crimes is a frequently utilized PR tactic to fight attempts at police reform, budget cuts, etc.

But the police in NYC used lots of spotsearches to boost both the crime rate (they discovered and so "solved" the crime at the same time) AND their crimes solved rate simultaneously. (Until the courts stopped them.) Only if both those stats go up together are the police incentivized to boost the crime rate.

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#66

It's coming to Seattle, too. Thieves smashed several of Nordstrom's windows at $50,000 apiece. Small businesses are simply giving up and leaving. I expect it won't be long before storefronts sprout rollup steel shields that extend from the pavement up and cover the complete storefront. That's what businesses do in Brazil. Amazon is abandoning one of its downtown buildings because the employees don't feel safe there a…

- "I expect it won't be long before storefronts sprout rollup steel shields that extend from the pavement up and cover the complete storefront. That's what businesses do in Brazil."

Afghanistan too. It's a jarring contrast to see heavy steel walls installed on mud (?) brick; those must have been carefully thought-out expenses.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/03/15/world/asia/af... (on pages 15 and 21; not linkable)

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Police unions are frequently feuding with city leadership. As an example, the NYPD doxxed DiBlasio's daughter in revenge for his position on the George Floyd murder: https://www.newsweek.com/nypd-sergeants-benevolent-associati... Overstating/cherrypicking crimes is a frequently utilized PR tactic to fight attempts at police reform, budget cuts, etc.

But the police in NYC used lots of spotsearches to boost both the crime rate (they discovered and so "solved" the crime at the same time) AND their crimes solved rate simultaneously. (Until the courts stopped them.) Only if both those stats go up together are the police incentivized to boost the crime rate.

That's why you pick specific stats that support your point, while pretending the others don't exist. Any time you see an oddly specific stat, you should question it a little.

For example: https://twitter.com/dceiver/status/1493643563892150278

"Shooting incidents are up 500% in an East Harlem precinct compared with last year" winds up describing going from one to six.

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#68
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insurance money doesn't come from nowhere, it comes from the people who are paying for a policy. If everybody is losing to the thieves then all insurance is gonna do is convert the lump sum losses into a monthly payment.

This isn't true. Insurance companies make money from float too which allows them to run on a loss when only comparing premiums to claims. It should be obvious that insurance serves as financial benefit for the insured or else the insurance industry would have collapsed a long time ago.

> This isn't true. Insurance companies make money from float too which allows them to run on a loss when only comparing premiums to claims.

You know what we call a business that makes enough money on float to cover its operating costs? A bank.

If the float was so lucrative they wouldn't need to charge "high enough to matter" premiums.

Insurance companies don't have magical investments they can make that other businesses can't. They're not going to be making $0.50 on the dollar you give them. They're going to be making pennies, just like literally everyone else. This will mostly go toward subsidizing operating costs. In no universe do insurance companies make enough profit from their money pile to even come close to offsetting payouts.

The fact of the matter is that theft affects the entire area so it WILL be reflected in premiums, the same way things like the climate and adverse weather are reflected in premiums.

>It should be obvious that insurance serves as financial benefit for the insured or else the insurance industry would have collapsed a long time ago.

Using insurance to cover routine expenses never makes financial sense. There's a reason businesses self-insure as much as they can.

Just because a financial product can be a net win doesn't mean that it will still be a net win if you use it exactly the wrong way. Speaking of things that should be obvious...

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#69
post #64
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Three strikes is excessively punitive" Maybe. It can be pretty easy to commit crimes, but in general felonies are tougher to be accidental (although not impossible). The three strikes law has to do with felonies. If 2 stints in prison haven't deterred them from committing serious crimes, then it's likely they won't change (although a side note is that the current system could be enhanced in terms of rehabilitation e…

>If 2 stints in prison haven't deterred them from committing serious crimes You are so close here. Maybe if the 2 stints in prison haven't deterred their crime it means that punishment isn't much of a deterrent and therefore we shouldn't blame decreased punishment for an increase in crime.

That's a stretch. If it's 3 strikes, then they're in for life (if they shoplift about $1k) and no longer committing the crime. Also, just because it didn't work for those repeat offenders, doesn't mean that the threat of punishment isn't a deterrent to a potential offender.

For example, as a kid you likely listened to your parents based on their threat of punishment. In reality, they have very little power and relatively minor punishments (with CPS getting involved).

Re: Petty Thieves Plague San Francisco. ‘These Last Two Years Have Been Insane.’

#70

It's coming to Seattle, too. Thieves smashed several of Nordstrom's windows at $50,000 apiece. Small businesses are simply giving up and leaving. I expect it won't be long before storefronts sprout rollup steel shields that extend from the pavement up and cover the complete storefront. That's what businesses do in Brazil. Amazon is abandoning one of its downtown buildings because the employees don't feel safe there a…

It is across the country at this point. IIRC Gascón, the former DA in SF is now the DA in LA and pursuing similar policies, while there are similar policies implemented or being implemented in other cities like Chicago and New York.

People will blame the police, but I think this is a symptom of far greater issues in society, whose costs have been offloaded leaving the police to (poorly) manage it because that's probably the best they can do and everyone else is too busy avoiding culpability.

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