6 ms·

Property theft and wage theft are two very different categories of theft. The average police department does not get involved in wage theft, which would be some

by brk 4y ago

Property theft and wage theft are two very different categories of theft. The average police department does not get involved in wage theft, which would be something more involving lawyers, maybe ultimately leading to an arrest warrant carried out by a police force. And of course this is another example of an "AND" decision, not an "OR" one. We can enforce and prosecute property theft crimes, which absolutely needs to happen, while simultaneously pursuing wage theft prosecution.

mikem170 4y ago
> Property theft and wage theft are two very different categories of theft. This kind of reinforces the parent's point. They are both theft (shoplifting and wage theft), and yet so many people are ok ignoring the numerically worse problem (wage theft). The fact that the police don't get involved and lawyers are required to rectify wage theft just shows how far we as a society don't care to defend those people. Meanwhile private security can get away with abusing shoplifters and homeless. Like you said, they are both theft, but for some reason we as a society go after one much more aggressively than the other. Something about that doesn't seem fair.
- jaywalk 4y ago
  How would you suggest that police get involved in wage theft?
  - mikem170 4y ago
    Maybe the same as when someone writes a bad check? It's my understanding that people get arrested for that, it's not left just to lawyers and civil contract courts (which not everyone can afford). Maybe also make wage theft easier to prove, with a required paper trail like an employment contract and signed time sheets, more investigators, etc. I'd be curious how other countries might handle this better, there's often places that have already done a good job of figuring stuff like this out. The cynic in me worries that dollars count more than votes, and that the system is not as interested in protecting employees as it is protecting employers.
    - phpisthebest 4y ago
      >>Maybe the same as when someone writes a bad check? That does not happen, not at the level of say shoplifting or something At most you can make a complaint, which will go to a prosecutor which will then decide if they want to file criminal charges, at which point the police would arrest someone. Which rarely happens for a single bad check. It is almost always CIVIL unless there is some other crime involved like identity theft, even then it would have to be wide scale You know what, that is the same process for Wage Theft. You file a complaint with the dept of labor, the dept of labor will investigate and if the problem is wide scale they will issue fines or even criminal indictment if they view it as malicious >Maybe also make wage theft easier to prove, with a required paper trail like an employment contract and signed time sheets, more investigators, etc. The problem here is wage theft is not often as cut and dry as you make it out to be, most often is not an employer refusing to pay wages or writting a bad check for wages. It manifests as forcing an employee to work during their lunch or break, refusing to pay earned vacation time/PTO when someone quits, paying strait time instead of OT rates for Overtime, misidentifying an employee as exempt denying them OT, etc. These are all things that are harder to prove and in some cases can be honest mistakes.
      - mikem170 4y ago
        I don't flat out argue with anything you are saying. It would be difficult to do a better job of catching wage theft. But if we're not going to put more effort into catching those criminals, why are we ok with putting more effort into catching shoplifters? Why are we allowing poorly trained armed security to roam public streets and sometimes harass, beat up, or shoot law abiding citizens, to the point that local prosecutors are frustrated with what is going on? How come we allow stuff like this, pulling out the stops for shoplifters, but not wage-theives? How come people argue in favor of the one but not the other?
        phpisthebest 4y ago
        You have created a Strawman in your head and now debating agaist that strawman and not anything anyone has said here or anywhere that I am aware of This whataboutism around wage theft has no bearing on this converation nor is anyone in either government, or here in this discussion ever talked about not taking wage theft seriously When wage theft is reported it gets investigated, and as the studies people have posted here show often gets recovered. The problem here and why you are seeing private security is because unlike with wage theft when someone reports shoplifting or other property crime it is often completely ignored, with out even a response at all from the government. You have this world view that is the exact opposite of reality, where by you believe wage theft is completely ignored by everyone but entire armies are fighting shoplifting how about instead of engaging with whataboutism, strawmans and redherrings we talk about the actual issues of criminality
  - FrontierPsych 4y ago
    Just like any other theft. If an employer is shown to commit wage theft, then they are arrested. I can pull up my GPS on my phone and show them exactly where I was during the prior week, how many hours, and if the hours don't match the paycheck, the owner gets arrested, brought to jail, booked for theft, has to hire an attorney, may get convicted and if it is a regular habitual offender type of thing, maybe get life in prison. A 33-year-old black man named Curtis Wilkerson was waiting for his girlfriend at a mall. He went into a department store and put a pair of socks in his shopping bag, and walked out. A $2.50 pair of ordinary tube socks. He was put in jail for 25 to life because he had 2 prior convictions - being a "lookout" in a robbery. But parole is denied 80% of the time, and governors override the parole boards decision to parole them at 50% of the time, he wouldn't get out in 25 years most likely. He also got fined $2,500 for the pair of $2.50 pair of socks. Should a wage theft of $2,000 fine the manager or company $2,000,000 which is the same ratio? Sounds good to me, it would put a stop to wage theft fast. In prison, he earns $20/month, and the state takes $11 every month to pay that $2,500 fine. They take over half his earnings - do that to a business. He won't be able to pay the $2,500 fine off until he is 90 years old. Another guy got life for stealing a slice of pizza. A guy who went away forever for lifting a pair of baby shoes. One got 50 to life for helping himself to five children’s videotapes from Kmart. One guy got life for possessing 0.14 grams of meth? Why not life in prison for wage theft? How is it any different than anything else? Saying they "didn't know" or "was a mistake" is like a shoplifter saying the exact same thing, but the shoplifter is prosecuted anyways if they say that.
- prepend 4y ago
  > yet so many people are ok ignoring the numerically worse problem (wage theft). I think this is a false argument as I don’t think people are ok ignoring wage theft. Others have pointed out as these aren’t exclusive options but, specifically, I’ve never heard anyone espouse that wage theft is ok. It seems to me that in a conversation concerning sexual harassment, someone points out that everyone is ok with human trafficking because it is worse, yet HR departments aren’t working to stop human trafficking.
  - mikem170 4y ago
    I guess the comparison was made, and caught my attention, because we are allowing business owners to hire undertrained armed private security guards to roam the public streets and sometimes harass law abiding citizens, to the point that local prosecutors complained about a lack of accountability, to stop shoplifting, but we're not doing anything more to stop wage theft, and it appeared that some people didn't see any problem with that. Where does this lead? Isn't the government supposed to have a monopoly on violence in a modern state? Or are we allowing anyone with money to hire armed enforcers in public places? Would victims of wage theft be justified taking the law into their own hands also, since they are dealing with a bigger problem than shoplifiting? I'm exploring this issue, more than opinionated, but think it's worth talking about.
- brk 4y ago
  I'm not saying we should ignore wage theft. I am saying it is a scenario where a police force cannot really do much. You can call your local PD and report shoplifting, or most other kinds of physical theft. It would be a pretty clear accusation, and these days odds are you'd be able to produce some simple evidence in the form of video footage (CCTV, cellphone, etc.). But how do you report wage theft in a way that the average police force can act on? Are you going to call and say "I'm being forced to work unpaid hours"? If you did I can almost guarantee you they would refer you to some other department or organization. I would not envision the police showing up to arrest your employer, take them in for questioning, etc. Wage theft is also slightly more complex in that the victims are often complicit in the sense that they continue to work for the employer. To be clear, I am not saying this makes it right, but it makes it hard for the police to do much from an enforcement perspective. You're saying your employer is underpaying you, but you're also continuing to work for them. The employer would tell the police that showed up that you were free to leave, or were agreeing to the term by virtue of showing up. It would take legal action, e.g. a lawyer not a cop, to actually create a claim that was actionable and enforceable by the law enforcement organization.
  - mikem170 4y ago
    > But how do you report wage theft in a way that the average police force can act on? I follow what you are saying, and admit there's not an obvious easy answer. I'd also say that private security guards who roam the public streets (sometimes harassing law abiding people) are not the best answer to shoplifting. Hmmm, thinking about this it doesn't seem right to leave wage theft as a civil matter - a lot of victims don't have the resources to engage a lawyer. Maybe we could do things so the deck is not so much stacked against them. More of a paper trail, like an employment contract specifying hours and wages and a paper trail of time sheets. Also making it much easier to report, and treating it as a criminal matter. We could if we wanted to, nothing is set in stone. Maybe also more investigators. Perhaps victims could submit audio and/or video evidence to government authorities. Why should law-abiding employers object to being taped, when they are happy to tape the public to catch shoplifters? It would be nice to figure out how to prevent the exploitation of vulnerable people. It's a lot of money to them. I kind of threw my comment out there because I know that it burns when someone is victimized by theft, whether by a shoplifter or an employer, but there seems to be a lot more people are quick to be offended by shoplifters then when employers are doing the stealing. I didn't mean to mischaracterize your views on this.

by brk 4y ago

mikem170 4y ago

> Property theft and wage theft are two very different categories of theft. This kind of reinforces the parent's point. They are both theft (shoplifting and wage theft), and yet so many people are ok ignoring the numerically worse problem (wage theft). The fact that the police don't get involved and lawyers are required to rectify wage theft just shows how far we as a society don't care to defend those people. Meanwhile private security can get away with abusing shoplifters and homeless. Like you said, they are both theft, but for some reason we as a society go after one much more aggressively than the other. Something about that doesn't seem fair.

jaywalk 4y ago
How would you suggest that police get involved in wage theft?
- mikem170 4y ago
  Maybe the same as when someone writes a bad check? It's my understanding that people get arrested for that, it's not left just to lawyers and civil contract courts (which not everyone can afford). Maybe also make wage theft easier to prove, with a required paper trail like an employment contract and signed time sheets, more investigators, etc. I'd be curious how other countries might handle this better, there's often places that have already done a good job of figuring stuff like this out. The cynic in me worries that dollars count more than votes, and that the system is not as interested in protecting employees as it is protecting employers.
  - phpisthebest 4y ago
    >>Maybe the same as when someone writes a bad check? That does not happen, not at the level of say shoplifting or something At most you can make a complaint, which will go to a prosecutor which will then decide if they want to file criminal charges, at which point the police would arrest someone. Which rarely happens for a single bad check. It is almost always CIVIL unless there is some other crime involved like identity theft, even then it would have to be wide scale You know what, that is the same process for Wage Theft. You file a complaint with the dept of labor, the dept of labor will investigate and if the problem is wide scale they will issue fines or even criminal indictment if they view it as malicious >Maybe also make wage theft easier to prove, with a required paper trail like an employment contract and signed time sheets, more investigators, etc. The problem here is wage theft is not often as cut and dry as you make it out to be, most often is not an employer refusing to pay wages or writting a bad check for wages. It manifests as forcing an employee to work during their lunch or break, refusing to pay earned vacation time/PTO when someone quits, paying strait time instead of OT rates for Overtime, misidentifying an employee as exempt denying them OT, etc. These are all things that are harder to prove and in some cases can be honest mistakes.
    - mikem170 4y ago
      I don't flat out argue with anything you are saying. It would be difficult to do a better job of catching wage theft. But if we're not going to put more effort into catching those criminals, why are we ok with putting more effort into catching shoplifters? Why are we allowing poorly trained armed security to roam public streets and sometimes harass, beat up, or shoot law abiding citizens, to the point that local prosecutors are frustrated with what is going on? How come we allow stuff like this, pulling out the stops for shoplifters, but not wage-theives? How come people argue in favor of the one but not the other?
      - phpisthebest 4y ago
        You have created a Strawman in your head and now debating agaist that strawman and not anything anyone has said here or anywhere that I am aware of This whataboutism around wage theft has no bearing on this converation nor is anyone in either government, or here in this discussion ever talked about not taking wage theft seriously When wage theft is reported it gets investigated, and as the studies people have posted here show often gets recovered. The problem here and why you are seeing private security is because unlike with wage theft when someone reports shoplifting or other property crime it is often completely ignored, with out even a response at all from the government. You have this world view that is the exact opposite of reality, where by you believe wage theft is completely ignored by everyone but entire armies are fighting shoplifting how about instead of engaging with whataboutism, strawmans and redherrings we talk about the actual issues of criminality
- FrontierPsych 4y ago
  Just like any other theft. If an employer is shown to commit wage theft, then they are arrested. I can pull up my GPS on my phone and show them exactly where I was during the prior week, how many hours, and if the hours don't match the paycheck, the owner gets arrested, brought to jail, booked for theft, has to hire an attorney, may get convicted and if it is a regular habitual offender type of thing, maybe get life in prison. A 33-year-old black man named Curtis Wilkerson was waiting for his girlfriend at a mall. He went into a department store and put a pair of socks in his shopping bag, and walked out. A $2.50 pair of ordinary tube socks. He was put in jail for 25 to life because he had 2 prior convictions - being a "lookout" in a robbery. But parole is denied 80% of the time, and governors override the parole boards decision to parole them at 50% of the time, he wouldn't get out in 25 years most likely. He also got fined $2,500 for the pair of $2.50 pair of socks. Should a wage theft of $2,000 fine the manager or company $2,000,000 which is the same ratio? Sounds good to me, it would put a stop to wage theft fast. In prison, he earns $20/month, and the state takes $11 every month to pay that $2,500 fine. They take over half his earnings - do that to a business. He won't be able to pay the $2,500 fine off until he is 90 years old. Another guy got life for stealing a slice of pizza. A guy who went away forever for lifting a pair of baby shoes. One got 50 to life for helping himself to five children’s videotapes from Kmart. One guy got life for possessing 0.14 grams of meth? Why not life in prison for wage theft? How is it any different than anything else? Saying they "didn't know" or "was a mistake" is like a shoplifter saying the exact same thing, but the shoplifter is prosecuted anyways if they say that.
prepend 4y ago
> yet so many people are ok ignoring the numerically worse problem (wage theft). I think this is a false argument as I don’t think people are ok ignoring wage theft. Others have pointed out as these aren’t exclusive options but, specifically, I’ve never heard anyone espouse that wage theft is ok. It seems to me that in a conversation concerning sexual harassment, someone points out that everyone is ok with human trafficking because it is worse, yet HR departments aren’t working to stop human trafficking.
- mikem170 4y ago
  I guess the comparison was made, and caught my attention, because we are allowing business owners to hire undertrained armed private security guards to roam the public streets and sometimes harass law abiding citizens, to the point that local prosecutors complained about a lack of accountability, to stop shoplifting, but we're not doing anything more to stop wage theft, and it appeared that some people didn't see any problem with that. Where does this lead? Isn't the government supposed to have a monopoly on violence in a modern state? Or are we allowing anyone with money to hire armed enforcers in public places? Would victims of wage theft be justified taking the law into their own hands also, since they are dealing with a bigger problem than shoplifiting? I'm exploring this issue, more than opinionated, but think it's worth talking about.
brk 4y ago
I'm not saying we should ignore wage theft. I am saying it is a scenario where a police force cannot really do much. You can call your local PD and report shoplifting, or most other kinds of physical theft. It would be a pretty clear accusation, and these days odds are you'd be able to produce some simple evidence in the form of video footage (CCTV, cellphone, etc.). But how do you report wage theft in a way that the average police force can act on? Are you going to call and say "I'm being forced to work unpaid hours"? If you did I can almost guarantee you they would refer you to some other department or organization. I would not envision the police showing up to arrest your employer, take them in for questioning, etc. Wage theft is also slightly more complex in that the victims are often complicit in the sense that they continue to work for the employer. To be clear, I am not saying this makes it right, but it makes it hard for the police to do much from an enforcement perspective. You're saying your employer is underpaying you, but you're also continuing to work for them. The employer would tell the police that showed up that you were free to leave, or were agreeing to the term by virtue of showing up. It would take legal action, e.g. a lawyer not a cop, to actually create a claim that was actionable and enforceable by the law enforcement organization.
- mikem170 4y ago
  > But how do you report wage theft in a way that the average police force can act on? I follow what you are saying, and admit there's not an obvious easy answer. I'd also say that private security guards who roam the public streets (sometimes harassing law abiding people) are not the best answer to shoplifting. Hmmm, thinking about this it doesn't seem right to leave wage theft as a civil matter - a lot of victims don't have the resources to engage a lawyer. Maybe we could do things so the deck is not so much stacked against them. More of a paper trail, like an employment contract specifying hours and wages and a paper trail of time sheets. Also making it much easier to report, and treating it as a criminal matter. We could if we wanted to, nothing is set in stone. Maybe also more investigators. Perhaps victims could submit audio and/or video evidence to government authorities. Why should law-abiding employers object to being taped, when they are happy to tape the public to catch shoplifters? It would be nice to figure out how to prevent the exploitation of vulnerable people. It's a lot of money to them. I kind of threw my comment out there because I know that it burns when someone is victimized by theft, whether by a shoplifter or an employer, but there seems to be a lot more people are quick to be offended by shoplifters then when employers are doing the stealing. I didn't mean to mischaracterize your views on this.