171–180 of 286 posts
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Why hasn’t the economist of the world figured out a solution to this problem. There has to be a better way when both sides would be better off by just paying the theif double. Some kind of proof of work system to show that you really are crazy enough to do the crime maybe.
This is called prison, but that's pushing the easy button which is strictly forbidden.
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Those are pre-requisites, but not enough. You also need society to have local cultures, as well as the culture at large, that actively oppose such behavior as immoral and/or shameful, with enforcement by peers. This I say based on two well-proven models, the sociological typology of societies as guilt, shame, or fear-based, and the psychological model of the six stages (level of complexity) of moral reasoning, that s…
Japan, the society with such a corrupt criminal justice system that being arrested for anything regardless of guilt is generally considered the end of your prospects in life?
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Isn’t the most obvious response from economics that the crime needs to be made more expensive? In other words, the likelihood of being harmed while attempting the crime needs to be much higher. If a quarter of the people who tried a comparable theft got thrown in jail for 2 years and another quarter got shot by a security guard, I suspect attempts would be rare. The financial damage done by the thief is presumably ir…
Nope. The surest disincentive is knowing you will be caught, not the penalty. If you can get away with it, then what value the penalty?
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Why hasn’t the economist of the world figured out a solution to this problem. There has to be a better way when both sides would be better off by just paying the theif double. Some kind of proof of work system to show that you really are crazy enough to do the crime maybe.
This is called prison, but that's pushing the easy button which is strictly forbidden.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why hasn’t the economist of the world figured out a solution to this problem. There has to be a better way when both sides would be better off by just paying the theif double. Some kind of proof of work system to show that you really are crazy enough to do the crime maybe.
> Why hasn’t the economist of the world figured out a solution to this problem. They have. It's called insurance. The problem here might be the change in copper prices which possibly increased the value of the line and which were never properly reassessed for coverage. > better off by just paying the theif double. You could also just require a license to scrap copper. That people can show up with a suspicious pile of…
In other words, economists haven't solved the problem. Insurance just kicks the can down the road.
> You could also just require a license to scrap copper.
That doesn't work. The UK and US already have laws to make it hard to sell illegally-gotten scrap metal. But black markets and "laundering" will always exist as a workaround. These things are riskier, and result in lower returns for the thief, but it doesn't stamp out the problem.
In Detroit copper theft was an epidemic a few years back. Once the easy stuff in abandoned houses was gone thieves went further afield. . A few brave thieves went after power substations. For some thieves a lack of knowledge was fatal. https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2017...
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We live in a very rural, incredibly safe area. You can always tell when someone else gets hooked on meth. Their place goes to shit, step 1. Their kids get dirty, step 2. You start to see things like car batteries or tools disappear from nearby farms, step 3. They die or go to jail after trying to steal something big, like electric lines or even train rails in one instance, step 4. At least with heroine, they tend to…
My apartment was broken into once and I knew it was a meth head because they color coordinated my closet before they left. Turned out to be someone I knew (on meth)
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Other than those who commit grave offenses of bodily harm, I reserve my greatest disgust for the type of dirtbag who imposes these orders-of-magnitude greater costs on other innocent people for such a relatively low "reward." They'd burn the Mona Lisa for fuel, melt down the Statue of Liberty for scrap, anything if you let them. I agree with another commenter here, the overlap of this mindset with tweakers is large.
In general I agree with you, but it also makes me wonder how these people got to this point. I think most people would burn the Mona Lisa if it meant surviving through a cold night. Our society has failed these people in many ways.
The people you mention are failing society, not the other way around.
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This site is so fuckin out of touch with the average American I can help but get pissed off after a few beers on the weekend. The tech stuff is good, but the social/political stuff here drives me nuts.
I don't think the average American sympathizes with random shitheads, bro. romanticizing thieves into some kind of noble morally grey antiheroes wronged by the society and struggling to feed their kids is a uniquely bohemian delusion. 9 times out of 10 they're junkie lowlives who would amount to nothing with all the opportunity in the world. wanna bet that in a few days there will be a follow up with mugshots and sho…
As a gross generalization, they don't. But not because they don't understand being poor, but because there are various powerful groups that benefit from pitting the lower class against themselves.
But "poor people" aren't a monolithic group with an absolutist view on the issue. There's a nuanced understanding of low level crimes in impoverished communities. People are much more likely to be pissed at a crackhead that stole their neighbors stuff, than a mother stealing food from a chain store.
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>Because the only solutions that work are social. This kind of talk from leftist politicians translates to me as : "We will use the criminally insane, and drug addicted against you in a campaign of terror until you vote in Communists. We will do everything in our power to prevent you from imprisoning these people or the people who poison them with drugs to maintain our leverage over you and increase our political pow…
Yes it’s very easy to have 90% approval and hear no downsides to your regime when you execute and imprison people for disapproval. Oh you have some complaints? You must be a drug dealer. Death for you.