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A moment ago the conversation was about violent crime and "over-policing creates racist bias in crime data". Now it's about laws treating corporate crimes more

A moment ago the conversation was about violent crime and "over-policing creates racist bias in crime data". Now it's about laws treating corporate crimes more leniently. You raise good points, and use them to deftly move past all the claims of racism that homicide statistics and victim surveys largely (but not entirely) refute.

geofft 5y ago
I think the wage theft point is relevant (I was going to bring it up too) for two reasons: 1. Directly, wage theft affects people's ability to get out of poverty and build wealth. Wage theft is a problem that disproportionately affects lower-income people (because they're more likely to rely on wages, instead of salaries or investments) and is disproportionately worse for lower-wealth people (because they can't as easily absorb a loss of $1,000 by covering it out of savings). We know, from those very same victim surveys, that poverty correlates with crime. In fact https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/household-poverty-and-nonfatal-violent-victimization-2008-2012 https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/household-poverty-a... points out that poverty correlates with being a victim of crime. 2. Less directly, but more interestingly from a philosophical standpoint, wage theft is a great example of a crime where how you classify it impacts statistics. Victim surveys tend to look at robberies. Wage theft isn't a "robbery," but if you lose $1,000 from your employer, that's much worse for you than being mugged at knife-point and losing $100 from your wallet. And if you look at homicides: Los Angeles has 200-something homicides per year. It also has 40-something police-caused deaths per year, which are generally not called "homicides." It also has 200-something deaths from car accidents a year, which are also generally not called "homicides." You're equally dead through any of these means, but crime surveys create a specific definition of "violent crime" that only looks at certain forms of violence.
eesmith 5y ago
And you've deftly moved past the question "How do you determine if the police are being successful?" Is your metric only homicide statistics? geofft commented "police refusing to take police reports or saying that something is a civil matter". My examples were meant to reinforce that issue, where crime statistics place far less weight on theft of services than theft of property, even when the monetary amounts involved are similar. FWIW, wage theft isn't only a corporate crime. If I promise to pay someone to mow my lawn, and he does it, and I don't pay him (perhaps threatening to call the police because I suspect he's an immigrant without work papers), then that's also wage theft, even though I am not a corporation.
- chuckee 5y ago
  Directly addressing a claim made in the post I replied to (police manipulation/bias of statistics) is not "moving past" anything. You're welcome to continue onto ever more abstract or systemic claims of racism and bias, but please don't begrudge me pointing out when some of the stepping stones crumble along the way.
  - eesmith 5y ago
    You wrote "One could compare police statistics with victim surveys". On could also compare other statistics, and show that police are over-funded compared to other sorts of enforcement agencies. The very act of picking which statistics to use is itself biased. Simply pointing to NCVS is not going to be convincing. Which numbers should we look at? What correlations should we draw? How should we understand the biases in the interpretation? What alternative explanations are there for whatever it is you haven't actually said? Without pointers to what what your actual point is, I figured it was just as appropriate to point out how your foundation is itself crumbled.

geofft 5y ago

I think the wage theft point is relevant (I was going to bring it up too) for two reasons: 1. Directly, wage theft affects people's ability to get out of poverty and build wealth. Wage theft is a problem that disproportionately affects lower-income people (because they're more likely to rely on wages, instead of salaries or investments) and is disproportionately worse for lower-wealth people (because they can't as easily absorb a loss of $1,000 by covering it out of savings). We know, from those very same victim surveys, that poverty correlates with crime. In fact https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/household-poverty-and-nonfatal-violent-victimization-2008-2012 https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/household-poverty-a... points out that poverty correlates with being a victim of crime. 2. Less directly, but more interestingly from a philosophical standpoint, wage theft is a great example of a crime where how you classify it impacts statistics. Victim surveys tend to look at robberies. Wage theft isn't a "robbery," but if you lose $1,000 from your employer, that's much worse for you than being mugged at knife-point and losing $100 from your wallet. And if you look at homicides: Los Angeles has 200-something homicides per year. It also has 40-something police-caused deaths per year, which are generally not called "homicides." It also has 200-something deaths from car accidents a year, which are also generally not called "homicides." You're equally dead through any of these means, but crime surveys create a specific definition of "violent crime" that only looks at certain forms of violence.

eesmith 5y ago

And you've deftly moved past the question "How do you determine if the police are being successful?" Is your metric only homicide statistics? geofft commented "police refusing to take police reports or saying that something is a civil matter". My examples were meant to reinforce that issue, where crime statistics place far less weight on theft of services than theft of property, even when the monetary amounts involved are similar. FWIW, wage theft isn't only a corporate crime. If I promise to pay someone to mow my lawn, and he does it, and I don't pay him (perhaps threatening to call the police because I suspect he's an immigrant without work papers), then that's also wage theft, even though I am not a corporation.

chuckee 5y ago
Directly addressing a claim made in the post I replied to (police manipulation/bias of statistics) is not "moving past" anything. You're welcome to continue onto ever more abstract or systemic claims of racism and bias, but please don't begrudge me pointing out when some of the stepping stones crumble along the way.
- eesmith 5y ago
  You wrote "One could compare police statistics with victim surveys". On could also compare other statistics, and show that police are over-funded compared to other sorts of enforcement agencies. The very act of picking which statistics to use is itself biased. Simply pointing to NCVS is not going to be convincing. Which numbers should we look at? What correlations should we draw? How should we understand the biases in the interpretation? What alternative explanations are there for whatever it is you haven't actually said? Without pointers to what what your actual point is, I figured it was just as appropriate to point out how your foundation is itself crumbled.