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You might be able to make a solid case that wage theft results in greater nominal amounts of theft than violent theft, but that doesn't mean it's a bigger probl

by ve55 8y ago

You might be able to make a solid case that wage theft results in greater nominal amounts of theft than violent theft, but that doesn't mean it's a bigger problem as the title assumes. The reason we are so hard on violent criminals isn't because they stole a small amount of money or property, it's because of the violence part. We place a lot of value on human life and safety, and when there's a notable probability of someone being stabbed or shot, things get significantly worse. Wage theft may result in some bad problems as well, but I can't imagine it leads to more people being stabbed or shot.

49531 8y ago
Theft isn't inherently tied to violence. It's easy to think of someone breaking into your home with a ski mask on, instead of embezzlement or pirating software. I would argue that wage theft is a bigger problem in the sense that the scope is so much larger. This article brings up wage theft amounts in _recovered_ wages and it still trumps regular theft. I'd guess a lot of people on this thread have experienced wage theft, I know I have. Would I rather a corporation steal $12,000 from me every year, or a burglar break into my home and steal my shit? I know I wouldn't pay $12,000 for a security system for my house.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- dlp211 8y ago
  More importantly, you can insure yourself against burglary, you can't insure yourself against wage theft.
- awat 8y ago
  One of my favorite quotes I’ve mentioned on HN a few times applies here. It’s only a crime if it occurs on the street level anything above that and it’s called politics.
  - ddingus 8y ago
    Nice. Lucid too.
- edanm 8y ago
  > Theft isn't inherently tied to violence. It's easy to think of someone breaking into your home with a ski mask on, instead of embezzlement or pirating software. Well, I think you're just defining theft differently than the parent. In most people's minds (I think), when you talk about theft, you're talking about something with at least implied violence. This is exactly why non-violent (and semi-victimless) crimes like white collar crimes, pirating software, etc, tend to have lighter sentences and generally be looked at differently. This forum in particular is a place where people often make the case that software piracy shouldn't even be called piracy/theft, partially for this reason! > I would argue that wage theft is a bigger problem in the sense that the scope is so much larger. Valid, but I think you're just defining "bigger" here differently than parent. It seems like you're talking pure scope of people affected, whereas parent is including how severely the people are affected. I don't think that's a very interesting discussion to be honest - it's just defining words. I imagine both of you will agree with the statement "one impacts more people, but the other impacts people more severely, ideally we should try to combat both", no? > Would I rather a corporation steal $12,000 from me every year, or a burglar break into my home and steal my shit? I know I wouldn't pay $12,000 for a security system for my house. Yes, but, with every time someone breaks into your house there's a chance you might be hurt or killed... doesn't that change your calculus here? (Of course the actual numbers matter though!)
  - salawat 8y ago
    What says that there isn't an equal chance of dying from complicated health issues that can't get attended to or mechanical repairs that can't be done because one JUST CAN'T AFFORD it right now? Don't try to hide behind "it isn't violence". Everything is violence if you think hard enough. We just prune down the scope to what happens to be convenient at the time. The real qualifier for what makes this "theft" is the asymmetry of value generated for the payer vs. the reward returned to the payee. Think about if that janitor WEREN'T there. She just stayed home and hardened somehow. No more floor\workspace cleaning, no more trash being emptied, no more bathrooms being restocked, no more Windows being cleaned. I'd like to see 90% of businesses that hire janitors workplace productivity after not having them around. Now look at programmers. System's I develop transact billions of times a quarter, generating millions in revenue. Suppose all of the people capable of developing those services refused to work as well? Things would go along fine for the most part. Millions would still roll in. So, yeah. It's theft. In BOTH cases. We just like to draw lines between skilled and unskilled labor and say "this person is more valuable than that person". It's why the phrase "Human Resources" became a thing. It isn't about doing business in good faith with someone else. It's about stroking egos and making the financials look good. I don't know the solution, but when most normal people I know make 4 times less than the average programmer for an equal investment of their lives to someone else's ends, there is some stinking problem going on, and it isn't just "the market at work". That's a part undoubtedly, but there seems to be something structural underlying it all as well. There is no reason why wage growth should not have scaled with capacity to generate revenue.
th0ma5 8y ago
Well, network effects in aggregate maybe?
Barrin92 8y ago
>it's because of the violence part. We place a lot of value on human life and safety, it's not because of the violence itself, it's because of the visibility of this particular form of violence and the resulting news coverage. There are plenty of forms of violence present in our societies that we do not give its due attention, domestic violence for example which, the recent two or three decades aside, was even tolerated. Same goes for wage theft, we don't pay attention because the people being robbed rarely have a voice. No cameraman drives to a home to interview someone who was the victim of wage theft, as it doesn't make for a very exciting visual evening cable news headline.
- Zak 8y ago
  The legal tradition of treating harm, threats or coercion to a person's body as more serious than theft or destruction of property predates the existence of television. The legal principle is about the violence. It's true, and sad that this principle hasn't been, and often still isn't applied fairly when it comes to domestic violence, violence against minorities and wealthy rapists, but failures to apply a principle fairly do not invalidate it entirely.
- edanm 8y ago
  > There are plenty of forms of violence present in our societies that we do not give its due attention, domestic violence for example which, the recent two or three decades aside, was even tolerated. You're right, but this doesn't prove your main point. The fact that some things are more looked at than others doesn't mean that violence in general is not a dividing line.
knuththetruth 8y ago
>Wage theft may result in some bad problems as well, but I can't imagine it leads to more people being stabbed or shot. This is something of an absurd stance in a country with high-cost, private insurance like the US. People go without treatment, and sometimes die, out of fear of the associated cost. But somehow stealing money from them doesn't cause them bodily harm? Especially when a vast majority of this wage theft is being done to workers without employer provided health insurance?
- salawat 8y ago
  People don't like it when you point out the indirect effects of a system. I'm assuming that is why you got downvotes.
glenstein 8y ago
>The reason we are so hard on violent criminals isn't because they stole a small amount of money or property, it's because of the violence part. We have laws against violent activities just the same as we have laws against theft. We don't need to stop violence indirectly by policing activities associated with it. If it's only by blurring the lines between theft and violence that we can defend the focus on property theft over wage theft, that strikes me as implicit agreement with the basic argument made by the article.
tehwebguy 8y ago
Of course it's a bigger problem: it's happening more often, to more people, in larger amounts. Society may have a bigger problem with violent theft than with employers stealing wages, but that society views it this way in itself is a problem.
- edanm 8y ago
  I think you're just defining the size of a problem differently than parent. Parent (rightly or wrongly) assumes that things which are more violent are a bigger problem, whereas you seem to be purely looking at how many people this affects. > Society may have a bigger problem with violent theft than with employers stealing wages, but that society views it this way in itself is a problem. I'm with parent on this though, personally. I'd much rather more people lost some money than more people were physically hurt/killed. There are scope effects here - I wouldn't necessarily trade 1 armed robbery for 1,000 thefts or something. But I do think the OP is making a false equivalence which isn't really useful to the discussino.
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    But that's a completely false choice. You don't have to choose either; we can aggressively go after both.
    - edanm 8y ago
      I agree! All the more reason not to compare these in the article title.
  - tehwebguy 8y ago
    > I'd much rather more people lost some money than more people were physically hurt/killed. Ahh but no one has to get hurt, it's about intimidation. One robber uses a gun to intimidate the victim with the threat that they will feel pain or lose their actual life if they stand up. The other type of robber uses employment to intimidate the victim with the threat that they will lose their livelihood if they stand up. > There are scope effects here - I wouldn't necessarily trade 1 armed robbery for 1,000 thefts or something. I think that's a fair qualifier.
jancsika 8y ago
> You might be able to make a solid case that wage theft results in greater nominal amounts of theft than violent theft, but that doesn't mean it's a bigger problem as the title assumes. It's a bigger economic problem by at least an order of magnitude according to an article published on a website focusing on economic issues.
specialist 8y ago
"You might be able to make a solid case..." How? Thru research, publishing, and spelling out an analogy to help (most reasonable) people understand the scope? Kinda like Meixell & Eisenbury's the OP linked to? "...I can't imagine it leads to more people being stabbed or shot." Non sequitur. Did you have a point? Or are you just concern trolling?

by ve55 8y ago

49531 8y ago

Theft isn't inherently tied to violence. It's easy to think of someone breaking into your home with a ski mask on, instead of embezzlement or pirating software. I would argue that wage theft is a bigger problem in the sense that the scope is so much larger. This article brings up wage theft amounts in _recovered_ wages and it still trumps regular theft. I'd guess a lot of people on this thread have experienced wage theft, I know I have. Would I rather a corporation steal $12,000 from me every year, or a burglar break into my home and steal my shit? I know I wouldn't pay $12,000 for a security system for my house.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
dlp211 8y ago
More importantly, you can insure yourself against burglary, you can't insure yourself against wage theft.
awat 8y ago
One of my favorite quotes I’ve mentioned on HN a few times applies here. It’s only a crime if it occurs on the street level anything above that and it’s called politics.
- ddingus 8y ago
  Nice. Lucid too.
edanm 8y ago
> Theft isn't inherently tied to violence. It's easy to think of someone breaking into your home with a ski mask on, instead of embezzlement or pirating software. Well, I think you're just defining theft differently than the parent. In most people's minds (I think), when you talk about theft, you're talking about something with at least implied violence. This is exactly why non-violent (and semi-victimless) crimes like white collar crimes, pirating software, etc, tend to have lighter sentences and generally be looked at differently. This forum in particular is a place where people often make the case that software piracy shouldn't even be called piracy/theft, partially for this reason! > I would argue that wage theft is a bigger problem in the sense that the scope is so much larger. Valid, but I think you're just defining "bigger" here differently than parent. It seems like you're talking pure scope of people affected, whereas parent is including how severely the people are affected. I don't think that's a very interesting discussion to be honest - it's just defining words. I imagine both of you will agree with the statement "one impacts more people, but the other impacts people more severely, ideally we should try to combat both", no? > Would I rather a corporation steal $12,000 from me every year, or a burglar break into my home and steal my shit? I know I wouldn't pay $12,000 for a security system for my house. Yes, but, with every time someone breaks into your house there's a chance you might be hurt or killed... doesn't that change your calculus here? (Of course the actual numbers matter though!)
- salawat 8y ago
  What says that there isn't an equal chance of dying from complicated health issues that can't get attended to or mechanical repairs that can't be done because one JUST CAN'T AFFORD it right now? Don't try to hide behind "it isn't violence". Everything is violence if you think hard enough. We just prune down the scope to what happens to be convenient at the time. The real qualifier for what makes this "theft" is the asymmetry of value generated for the payer vs. the reward returned to the payee. Think about if that janitor WEREN'T there. She just stayed home and hardened somehow. No more floor\workspace cleaning, no more trash being emptied, no more bathrooms being restocked, no more Windows being cleaned. I'd like to see 90% of businesses that hire janitors workplace productivity after not having them around. Now look at programmers. System's I develop transact billions of times a quarter, generating millions in revenue. Suppose all of the people capable of developing those services refused to work as well? Things would go along fine for the most part. Millions would still roll in. So, yeah. It's theft. In BOTH cases. We just like to draw lines between skilled and unskilled labor and say "this person is more valuable than that person". It's why the phrase "Human Resources" became a thing. It isn't about doing business in good faith with someone else. It's about stroking egos and making the financials look good. I don't know the solution, but when most normal people I know make 4 times less than the average programmer for an equal investment of their lives to someone else's ends, there is some stinking problem going on, and it isn't just "the market at work". That's a part undoubtedly, but there seems to be something structural underlying it all as well. There is no reason why wage growth should not have scaled with capacity to generate revenue.

th0ma5 8y ago

Well, network effects in aggregate maybe?

Barrin92 8y ago

>it's because of the violence part. We place a lot of value on human life and safety, it's not because of the violence itself, it's because of the visibility of this particular form of violence and the resulting news coverage. There are plenty of forms of violence present in our societies that we do not give its due attention, domestic violence for example which, the recent two or three decades aside, was even tolerated. Same goes for wage theft, we don't pay attention because the people being robbed rarely have a voice. No cameraman drives to a home to interview someone who was the victim of wage theft, as it doesn't make for a very exciting visual evening cable news headline.

Zak 8y ago
The legal tradition of treating harm, threats or coercion to a person's body as more serious than theft or destruction of property predates the existence of television. The legal principle is about the violence. It's true, and sad that this principle hasn't been, and often still isn't applied fairly when it comes to domestic violence, violence against minorities and wealthy rapists, but failures to apply a principle fairly do not invalidate it entirely.
edanm 8y ago
> There are plenty of forms of violence present in our societies that we do not give its due attention, domestic violence for example which, the recent two or three decades aside, was even tolerated. You're right, but this doesn't prove your main point. The fact that some things are more looked at than others doesn't mean that violence in general is not a dividing line.

knuththetruth 8y ago

>Wage theft may result in some bad problems as well, but I can't imagine it leads to more people being stabbed or shot. This is something of an absurd stance in a country with high-cost, private insurance like the US. People go without treatment, and sometimes die, out of fear of the associated cost. But somehow stealing money from them doesn't cause them bodily harm? Especially when a vast majority of this wage theft is being done to workers without employer provided health insurance?

salawat 8y ago
People don't like it when you point out the indirect effects of a system. I'm assuming that is why you got downvotes.

glenstein 8y ago

>The reason we are so hard on violent criminals isn't because they stole a small amount of money or property, it's because of the violence part. We have laws against violent activities just the same as we have laws against theft. We don't need to stop violence indirectly by policing activities associated with it. If it's only by blurring the lines between theft and violence that we can defend the focus on property theft over wage theft, that strikes me as implicit agreement with the basic argument made by the article.

tehwebguy 8y ago

Of course it's a bigger problem: it's happening more often, to more people, in larger amounts. Society may have a bigger problem with violent theft than with employers stealing wages, but that society views it this way in itself is a problem.

edanm 8y ago
I think you're just defining the size of a problem differently than parent. Parent (rightly or wrongly) assumes that things which are more violent are a bigger problem, whereas you seem to be purely looking at how many people this affects. > Society may have a bigger problem with violent theft than with employers stealing wages, but that society views it this way in itself is a problem. I'm with parent on this though, personally. I'd much rather more people lost some money than more people were physically hurt/killed. There are scope effects here - I wouldn't necessarily trade 1 armed robbery for 1,000 thefts or something. But I do think the OP is making a false equivalence which isn't really useful to the discussino.
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  But that's a completely false choice. You don't have to choose either; we can aggressively go after both.
  - edanm 8y ago
    I agree! All the more reason not to compare these in the article title.
- tehwebguy 8y ago
  > I'd much rather more people lost some money than more people were physically hurt/killed. Ahh but no one has to get hurt, it's about intimidation. One robber uses a gun to intimidate the victim with the threat that they will feel pain or lose their actual life if they stand up. The other type of robber uses employment to intimidate the victim with the threat that they will lose their livelihood if they stand up. > There are scope effects here - I wouldn't necessarily trade 1 armed robbery for 1,000 thefts or something. I think that's a fair qualifier.

jancsika 8y ago

> You might be able to make a solid case that wage theft results in greater nominal amounts of theft than violent theft, but that doesn't mean it's a bigger problem as the title assumes. It's a bigger economic problem by at least an order of magnitude according to an article published on a website focusing on economic issues.

specialist 8y ago

"You might be able to make a solid case..." How? Thru research, publishing, and spelling out an analogy to help (most reasonable) people understand the scope? Kinda like Meixell & Eisenbury's the OP linked to? "...I can't imagine it leads to more people being stabbed or shot." Non sequitur. Did you have a point? Or are you just concern trolling?