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I hate to say this but I found the same when I studied this issue in my business ethics class in grad school (MBA). I wrote my end of term paper on this exact

I hate to say this but I found the same when I studied this issue in my business ethics class in grad school (MBA). I wrote my end of term paper on this exact issue. What it boils down to is that, on average, white collar criminals can expect to go home to $1 million per year of time actually served behind bars. It made me wonder what the expected outcome of the class was.

dkarras 7y ago
How does it generally work? Surely the money you steal / embezzle will be taken from you when you get caught no?
- CydeWeys 7y ago
  Many people don't get caught.
  - dkarras 7y ago
    But the post specifically compares the payout with number of years served.
    - Zarel 7y ago
      Another poster mentions that you can transfer/spend it in a way that's difficult to recover: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21275859 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21275859 But even if that wasn't true, you could still compare expected value. For instance, if you had an 80% chance of successfully embezzling $8 million without getting caught, and a 20% chance of serving 2 years of jail, this would translate to an expected value of $1 million per year served.
    - CydeWeys 7y ago
      Which is zero in many (most?) cases, because you don't get caught. The expected number of years served is gonna be something like, say, 80% chance of 0 years, or 20% chance of 10 years, averaging out to 2 years (I'm making these figures up). So if you get $2M from that, then you're averaging two years.
- hangonhn 7y ago
  A lot of these investigations are settled out of court with no admissions of guilt.
- belorn 7y ago
  People transfer it and convert it into property of their spouse, children and friends. In some cases this is extremely transparent and done days before charged, and its rarely ever recovered when that happens.
- joncrane 7y ago
  The people who get caught are, on average, able to hide enough of the money from the authorities through various means that they have some money to come home to, if you will. This means some people exit jail penniless and some exit jail with hundreds of millions. Perhaps the authors of the paper should have presented the median rather than the average; however as a typical college student I was more focused on delivering the assignment than criticizing the researchers.
hesk 7y ago
That sounds fascinating. Are you willing to share it?
- joncrane 7y ago
  It was about 20 years ago and the sources and writing are lost to the sands of time. But you might be able to Google it.

dkarras 7y ago

How does it generally work? Surely the money you steal / embezzle will be taken from you when you get caught no?

CydeWeys 7y ago
Many people don't get caught.
- dkarras 7y ago
  But the post specifically compares the payout with number of years served.
  - Zarel 7y ago
    Another poster mentions that you can transfer/spend it in a way that's difficult to recover: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21275859 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21275859 But even if that wasn't true, you could still compare expected value. For instance, if you had an 80% chance of successfully embezzling $8 million without getting caught, and a 20% chance of serving 2 years of jail, this would translate to an expected value of $1 million per year served.
  - CydeWeys 7y ago
    Which is zero in many (most?) cases, because you don't get caught. The expected number of years served is gonna be something like, say, 80% chance of 0 years, or 20% chance of 10 years, averaging out to 2 years (I'm making these figures up). So if you get $2M from that, then you're averaging two years.
hangonhn 7y ago
A lot of these investigations are settled out of court with no admissions of guilt.
belorn 7y ago
People transfer it and convert it into property of their spouse, children and friends. In some cases this is extremely transparent and done days before charged, and its rarely ever recovered when that happens.
joncrane 7y ago
The people who get caught are, on average, able to hide enough of the money from the authorities through various means that they have some money to come home to, if you will. This means some people exit jail penniless and some exit jail with hundreds of millions. Perhaps the authors of the paper should have presented the median rather than the average; however as a typical college student I was more focused on delivering the assignment than criticizing the researchers.

hesk 7y ago

That sounds fascinating. Are you willing to share it?

joncrane 7y ago
It was about 20 years ago and the sources and writing are lost to the sands of time. But you might be able to Google it.