Work or Steal?

"Today more than 3% of our work-force age men are incarcerated. Maybe they made the calculation that selling drugs or stealing was better than low-wage or no-mobility jobs."
Robyn Blumer in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (1)

Perhaps they have learned that sitting in prison is even worse than any job, no matter how menial or dead-end. I worry more about those who have chosen a life of crime and have gotten away with it----so far.

The conclusion reached by Miss Blumer ( also held by the editors of the Journal Sentinel and most urban politicians) that poverty causes crime is understandable. First, the crime rate among the poor is much higher than among the affluent, which is why you are more likely to get mugged at 6th and Center than in Fox Point. Second, it stands to reason that people who are desperate for money are more likely to turn to crime than those who can earn it honestly.

The only trouble is that a comparison of a typical American city, such as Milwaukee, during the depths of the Depression and today does not support the thesis that unemployment and poverty cause crime. By any objective measure, the people of Milwaukee enjoy a far higher standard of living today than did city residents in the Nineteen Thirties. Even the poor today have W-2 and food stamps, and many have public housing. Yet the crime rate in this city is much worse now. Moreover, many violent crimes, such as robbery and shootings, are committed by boys too young to hold a full-time job anyway, even if they could get one.

In my view, crime is caused by a lack of morality, not lack of jobs or money. I do not believe that the typical criminal makes the calculation cited by Miss Blumer. Rather, the crook is characterized by a number of personality traits that include extreme selfishness, lack of conscience, and a strong desire for immediate gratification. Such a person has no concern for the rights or well-being of others, and may even enjoy hurting other people. Someone with this criminal mentality would choose to rob or steal even if good jobs with excellent prospects were abundant in his community, and here is why:

Earning money through legitimate activity requires both effort and a willingness to subordinate one's own desires to those of another person, either a boss or a customer. The criminal, on the other hand, imposes his will on the victim by threats and the use of force, a far more attractive scenario to a sociopathhic person.

But then why would this type of personality disorder be much more common in poverty areas?

I believe that a key factor is lack of a father in the home, which is particularly devastating to the normal development of boys. Parents are role-models for children: mothers for girls and fathers for boys. If a boy grows up without a father to guide and discipline him, he will find adult male role-models elsewhere: in the school, in the church or synagogue, or in the street. A fatherless home will very likely be a poor home, and too often the adult males most respected (and feared) in poverty neighborhoods are the pimps, drug dealers, and other gangsters. (2) The prevalence of "gansta rap" in today's popular culture makes this lifestyle even more attractive to youth. A youngster growing up in this milieu will often join a local gang, whose ethos instills the pernicious values of greed, hostility, and violence. In this way, criminality is passed on from one generation to the next.

For this reason efforts to reduce crime by increasing economic opportunity are doomed to fail.( Of course we should strive for a robust economy with plenty of good jobs, but even the most astounding success in this endeavor will have little impact on the crime rate.)

Reducing the number of children raised in fatherless homes would ultimately cut crime, but this is extremely hard to do in a free society, and the effects on delinquency and crime would not be felt for about 12 years. Since most political offices have a 4-year term, you don't hear politicians advocating this strategy. Politicians must deliver results in the short term, so they are not interested in long-term plans.

Every candidate for Mayor of Milwaukee in 2008 will have a plan to curb crime in this city. So did every candidate in 2004, including the winner. Unfortunately, it is not likely than any of them will work.
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(1)"Upward Mobility Only for Upper Class" page 11A, April 11, 2007

(2) People who start out in a poverty-area and attain some degree of success ususally move to a middle-class neighorhood at the first opportunity, so they do not become role models for the children they leave behind. The gangsters, even when they have money, stay where they are respected. This is why the economic boom of the 1960's had no effect on crime, which increased.