[lbo-talk] violent crime up

andie nachgeborenen andie_nachgeborenen at yahoo.com
Wed Jun 14 10:39:33 PDT 2006



> >
> > The social inequality argument is basically a
> politically motivated opinion
> > without much empirical support. It does not even
> make much sense when you
> > think about: most poor people who should be
> criminals according to this
> > theory - in fact are not. Moreover, many rich
> people who should not be
> > criminals according to the same theory - in fact
> are.
> >
> > Wojtek
>

Crime rates are constant across socioeconomic status. Kinds of crime, drug _use_ aside, are not. "Some men rob you with a pistol, others with a fountain pen." My poor pro bono clients tend to be the pistol type, my rich paying ones the fountain pen type. I don't think _violent_ crime (spousal abuse aside) is nearly as high among the affluent classes as among the less affluent classes. Bankers, accountants, lawyers, doctors, are much less like (at least intuitively) to commit robberies, beat up people in bars, participate in gangland hits or drive-bys, than poorer youth (especially). Even their kids are likely to be far less likely to do that sort of thing. The upper classes probably shoot and and beat their wives and girlfriends at comparable rates, but on the whole they're more like to commit fraud, embezzlement, extortion (which means bribery in legalese), etc. Here isn Shytown we revel in public corruption, but the officials who go to jail and their pals go to for taking bribes and stealing public funds ort using ther official positions to benefit their friends for things of value rather than knocking over liquor stores or wjacking their rivals.

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