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The value provided by the infrastructure greatly exceeds the value of selling it as scrap. If it seems worthwhile to an individual to, effectively, turn dollars

• dylan604 1y ago
  You have a strange way of looking at this. From those doing the theft, it is pennies from nothing. It's not like they are spending money on anything. The tools being used are at best borrowed, but most likely stolen. So they only expense would be their time, and that's nothing especially if it's going to get them medicine so they aren't sick for however short time those pennies earned gets them.
  • noelwelsh 1y ago
    > it is pennies from nothing It is only pennies from nothing if the thief derives no benefit from the infrastructure. I don't, say, dig up a copper cable if that cable provides the Internet access I rely on to run my business or talk to my friends. The next obvious question to ask is why the thief doesn't benefit from the infrastructure, and the systemic answer is inequality. That's literally what inequality means: unequal access to resources and opportunities. Using your medicine example, it's unequal access to medicine that drives the crime.
    • dylan604 1y ago
      > I don't, say, dig up a copper cable if that cable provides the Internet access I rely on to run my business or talk to my friends. That’s the reason you’re going with? Not that you’re not a junkie and have decent paying job that makes this a money losing proposition for you because you are on the positive side of the inequality equation compared to a junkie?