Corporate crime is out of control. Reading the article on Goldman Sacs is just an example of how bad it is. I feel victimized because corporate crime has effected my savings, retirement and future. BUT, part of corporate crime is our fault as well. Do employees take the risk of "telling"? If the corp. is returning a profit and I gain from it, do I care? Is it only when "we" feel it, that it is wrong. I do believe we are seeing how corporate crime is starting to effect everyone; because it is starting to hit everyone in the pocket book, from insurance premium increases due to fraud, to Goldman Sachs and the stock market crash. Ethics are beginning to be taught again in classrooms, but is it too late? Can morales and ethics find a place in the corporate world again? I hope so! But the cost of prosecuting and housing criminals will be enormous and are we ready to accept responsiblity for it. As Emile Durkeim (sociologist) stated "crime is functional and is necessary for a society to progress because it may lead to needed social change". Apparantly our society needs to change to protect our future.
Let me start off by saying this is kind of funny in a since because you would be led to believe that the higher you are up in society the more civilized people would act. However we all know this is not true if anything there is more under handed things going on in the higher society. Corporate crimes are everywhere we look and how is it that we are surprised that companies are getting away will millions if not billions of dollars, sometime we ask for it i.e. automobile companies. Automobile companies do not care if people get hurt from vehicles they created as long as they can see that dollar bill at the end of the day. It’s like being in a gang, the man at the top will remain at the top because he uses others to do his dirty work that is till someone blows the whistle/ snitches or they slip up. A crime has to hurt someone regardless if it’s present or long term. Besides it’s not like if someone get in trouble for a corporate crime they will go to jail most of them pay their way out of trouble, it’s like releasing a gang member back into the streets they are more likely to repeat their actions to end up right back in jail, why is it that we don’t see this and change the rule. I’m just saying if I had a chose to commit a crime it would be a corporate crime because it would be like a slap on the wrist. I do agree with your statement that corporate crime is partly our fault because sometime there are red flags that we chose to ignore, just like the cartoon sometime we put up our blinders to the situation at hand. But to answer your question about morals and ethics in the corporation world, I feel there is no room for ethics and morals because it’s all about how the corporation can make fast cash with doing as little work as possible. That’s not saying there aren’t people or corporations who genuinely care for others it’s just they are over shadowed by the ones who don’t care.
The above cartoon appears to be a reflection of Richard Quinney and Marshall Clinard’s opinion. These sociologists believe the definition of white collar crime should have sub categories or sub types such as business, organizational, government, corporate, and occupational crimes. The general population is naïve in thinking that white collar crime is a new phenomenon; remember the terminology and definition of white collar crime by Edwin Sutherland was introduced in 1939. David Simon believes the name should be changed to Elite Defiance. I believe we wrongly believe the upper strata of society possess some intrinsic high ethical standard. The promotion of this idealism is by the upper strata, and they want us to believe they are beyond reproach. This false idealistic ethic was employed by Kenneth Lay at Enron. These criminals such as Lay, Bernard Madoff, and others somehow convince themselves the rules do not apply to them. They are criminals that possess a manipulative charm. They know that the chances of being caught is minimal and usually the punishment lenient. The quest for power, money, influence or some other personal gain is great. We want to believe these guys and that is why the estimate of white collar crime is only a portion of the extent of the crime because the majority of the victims never realize that they have been cheated.
The major problem with Corporations is that they know they can get away with it, and that in a few years the American public will have forgotten about the “incident”. Like it says in the article, “Now, corporate criminals don’t have to worry about pleading guilty to crimes. Three new loopholes have developed over the past five years – the deferred prosecution agreement, the non prosecution agreement, and pleading guilty a closet entity or a defunct entity that has nothing to lose.” They plead out or come clean on their own and wow, maybe they do care about what is happening. Let’s face it, no cooperate America does not care about the general public; it is all about the all mighty dollar. As we remember with the Ford Pinto, Ford decided it was cheaper to pay off the accident victims and their families than to recall and repair the problem. Yet most of today’s generation could not even tell you what the Pinto incident was about. Then there are the American people who turn a blind eye to the occurrences, I mean really, just because a large cooperation, or even a small one, donates 5% of it’s yearly profits to a worthy cause should we ignore what they are doing to our environment, to our children, to our lives and to our freedom? Take the BP incident for instance, yes they have been fined, and yes they were made to assist in the clean up of the Glue region, but some governmental entities and even scientists are raving about how the spilled oil has caused the rapid growth of “oil eating” bacteria and micro-organisms in the that area. So now we have to worry about what the possible side effects of these bacteria and organisms are to the environment. Will BP be held responsible for the damage done by the organisms spawned from this spill in say 20 or 30 years? Or will the next generation of people have forgotten about the cause of the growth of these organisms?
I see white collar corporate crime as the "politically correct" way to manipulate others to get what you want. Whether it be politician, corporate executives or a member of middle/upper class america. It just doesn't look as messy and coniving to steal from others quietly. The ones involved in this type of crime do not see the grand effects they have on the ones they leave behind. They are egotistical and think of noone but themselves. When you look at the difference in punishment between a petty thief or an "upstanding" corporate executive who cleans hard working americans out of millions of dollars, you can see what is advocated by our justice system and media to be the worst criminals in our society. It is very scary because it shows the depiction of what we consider to be a thief. If you were to line up an upstanding Harvard graduate, corporate executive along side an uneducated career thief, which would you be ready to prosecute? Then what would you do when you find out the career petty thief had affected society by about $3000 in his whole criminal career, but the corporate executive had effected thousands of people and gained millions of dollars (and I'm not even talking about the loss of lives)? My guess would be the thief is in prison for life (no worries for society anymore) and the executive is floating on a yacht (oh, he paid about $25,000 in restitution). GET REAL!
Lessons learned from this article: politics is a dirty game, corporate crime will get your hands dirty, corporate crime is being legalized, and if you want to prosecute it you'll be a very poor person. So to break all that down I'll go point by point. Politics is a dirty game: as the article points out to gain rank in politics go after corporate crime, but once you make it steer clear, make nice with the suits and go after street crime. Corporate crime will get your hands dirty: whether you were the one that actually poured the chemicals into the water or the one who signed off on it, in the end you're still just as guilty as the person(s) who did the act. Corporate crime is being legalized: in the mafia, in petty crime, one doesn't have any pull on legislation, but if you're a corporation with lobbyists working for you, it's scary but you can influence legislation. And lastly, if you want to prosecute corporate crime, you'll be a very poor person: who's going to support you, certainly not the corporations racking in the big bucks from their crimes. I think I'll stick with the church...nothing illegal ever happens there...they're not a corporation...or are they?
People are afraid of big business. Big business has their hands in everything. They have some much power and control that they are under prosecuted and get away with countless crimes. As stated in the article and having learned this in many of Greg’s class- Corporate crime causes more harm and damage on society than all street crime combined, even murder. This is astonishing. It is weird to hear the term corporate murder but the reality is that it does happen every day, as stated in the article, but they are rarely prosecuted. Even when they are prosecuted they have loopholes that are basically slaps on the hand. How is this justice? How is this acceptable? Something must be done. Big business should not influence how a country is run and should not get away with what they are getting away with.
Corporate crime to me is the worst crime because it’s the class of crime that indirectly effects every individual in the respected area. Corporate crime alone can cost Americans easily over 500 billion dollars a year. Where in street crimes account to 3.8 billion dollars a year. The horrible part of corporate crime is that the government doesn’t pass legislation for harsher punishments for corporate criminals. Charging them with civil actions hardly get the point across to not do it again. For example, Toyota, Toyota in 2009 needed all of their vehicles to be returned because of some malfunction that was causing accidents and deaths. Though Rudolph Giuliani was the an U.S. Attorney and prosecuted corporate crimes which was a good deed, however what I don’t agree with is the reason why; to gain political power, not for the improvement of society and civilization. If Rudy Giuliani for example, stood up not only to convict violators but would have summited to congress legislation for harsher punishments not only for the nation but for the state of New York then the annual death rate for Corporate crime would be lower than 16,000. There are no incentives for these corporations to change some regulations they have because if the government doesn’t deem it fit to care about its citizens and or the people who are negatively affected then why change?
Corporate Crime is very popular especially because of the people who commit it. These types of crimes are normally done by people who have a high position in our society. I think more people should be prosecuted because not only does it affect the corporation but also the victim's of the crime. There are so many types of corporate crime and the one that stands out to me the most are the governmental crimes. These types of crimes are just shocking to me because the government is suppose to protects it's citizens not cause them harm. For example, what is going on in Sudan that is a major governmental crime because the government is providing the armys the weapons to destroy it's people. I think something should seriously be done about that because innocent people are losing their lives because of GREED by it's own government.
If corporate crime makes more damage than street crime towards society, then who can we really trust but ourselves. SCREW being scared to walk to my car at night or the safety of my belongings in the “hood”. I should just re-route my scary nature to the people that have a great amount of “say-so” over my everyday life! They want to go around blaming all of the crime, violence, and chaos in the Crips, thugs, bloods, and the gangstas! Probably to only keep the citizens attention off of all the things they are hiding from us day to day.
It’s hard enough as it is to get health care. So when health care fraud is one of the 20 things to know about corporate crime and it’s costing Americans 100 billion to 400 billion a year behind their stupid mistakes, you can’t help but be scared for the safety and health care of the million of American families.
This statement came to my attention as I read the article. “For every company convicted of health care fraud, there are hundreds of others who get away with ripping off Medicare and Medicaid, or face only a mild slap-on-the-wrist fines and civil penalties when caught.” After reading this I immediately became upset! I myself an battling with Medicaid and Medicare and while I sit back and struggle trying to figure out how I am going to be able to pay for my next prescription of insulin and the other millions of people (Cancer patients with their kimo & people with heart problems and their heart medications, and millions of other people with medical issues), those BONEHEADS are playing around! And it’s absolutely absurd that when they get caught they only get put in “timeout” with a slap on the wrist?! They better hope I don’t get anywhere close to finding out who they are because if I do, then its going to be a mistake.
I tried calling 611 when Enron was in business but I received a busy signal. I agree with this article strongly, we the American Public entrusted our government to regulate Corporate America, but little did we know that the ones that were supposed to be regulating were the ones who were actually committing the crimes, "Goldman Sachs". I would always try to debate with the general public on which type of crime cause more harm, Criminal or Corporate? Before the stock markets crashed and millions of people lost their homes and jobs, the average person would say that Criminal would cause more harm. But since the public received a so called "dose of reality", they seem to have a sudden change of heart. Companies who destroy lives by fraudulent investments should receive longer prison sentences and not in a Federal Prison but a State Prison. The problem is the way our judicial system is set up, big time corporations can offered top lawyers who look for so called loopholes. You can commit any type of crime and get away with it just as long as you can offered it. I think that after the so called "Recession" is over, Congress will implicate tougher guidelines on how Corporate America works, and if anything this should be a HUGE WAKE UP CALL. Corporate/White Collar Crimes should be taken seriously, these types of crimes brought America and the World down to their knees.
Bernie, and a host of other confidence schemers are always looking to bilk the unsuspecting. The main target is the elderly who have built up a nice nest egg and want to make it stretch a bit farther. They buy into the plan and before they realize it everything they thought they had is gone. Enron was a prime example of corporate greed and deception, victimizing countless families. I thought it was a nice touch that Martha Stewart was locked up for insider trading. An example, yes, yet is has not deterred this practice just made it go a little deeper the hide it better. Corporate criminals should be treated as murders and grand theft, because of their actions they have destroyed families and driven others to take their own lives, all the ramifications of their greedy unethical business practices should fall squarely on the people who initiated and the people who carried out the deception. A little ZERO tollerence.
Your place settings in society are irrelevant, no matter where you are standing on the society scale, there is always crime and you will receive and not receive a certain amount of respect from a certain type of people. Pertaining to corporate crimes, the crime rate is high, that should come as a shock to people considering those individuals are placed in a position where they have the ability to reap the benefits of a higher stand point. The only difference from this crime and other crimes is its manipulation of the law. Corporations, because of their hierarchy position in society, the corporation can yield peoples say in the crime being committed. People that are subjected to this crime and suffer from it normally get paid to keep quiet or other tactics the company may use. That’s just covering the money side of things. People can lose their life or a life of a love one over, not just this crime, but any crime. However, unlike corporate crimes, those other crimes don’t have the resources or connections to say their favor in a greater advantage. The connections that other lower class crimes lack. As for the law standing, it’s not illegal, what they do some of the times and there are less prosecutors against corporate crimes.
Recite this list of corporate frauds and people will immediately say to you: but you can't compare street crime and corporate crime – corporate crime is not violent crime.
Not true.
Corporate crime is often violent crime.
The FBI estimates that, 16,000 Americans are murdered every year.
Compare this to the 56,000 Americans who die every year on the job or from occupational diseases such as black lung and asbestosis and the tens of thousands of other Americans who fall victim to the silent violence of pollution, contaminated foods, hazardous consumer products, and hospital malpractice.
These deaths are often the result of criminal recklessness. Yet, they are rarely prosecuted as homicides or as criminal violations of federal laws."
Corporate crime is not viewed as a violent crime because when it is reported by the media, it's not gory and bloody like a murder. The shock value isn't there in the story. Now, if corporate executives were on the sidewalk killing off their slackers, sure, that's a great story!
"Corporations love deferred prosecution agreements.
In the 1990s, if prosecutors had evidence of a crime, they would bring a criminal charge against the corporation and sometimes against the individual executives. And the company would end up pleading guilty.
Then, about three years ago, the Justice Department said – hey, there is this thing called a deferred prosecution agreement.
We can bring a criminal charge against the company. And we will tell the company – if you are a good company and do not violate the law for the next two years, we will drop the charges. No harm, no foul. This is called a deferred prosecution agreement.
And most major corporate crime prosecutions are brought this way now. The company pays a fine. The company is charged with a crime. But there is no conviction. And after two or three years, depending on the term of the agreement, the charges are dropped."
OSHA also falls into this category. There is a company in North Carolina, House of Raeford. House of Raeford showed HUGE improvements in their job safety records. Why? Because they were falsified. They would intimidate their workers into NOT reporting their injuries. Sadly, most of these workers didn't speak English very well and were in desperate need of their income to support their families. In some cases, when an injured employee would return to work in the same day as their injury because they would be afraid of losing their job. When safety reports for companies are low, OSHA doesn't inspect as often. I suppose this is a corporate reward.
There is so much money paying off corporate attorneys, that defeating seems impossible. The battle needs to start at the top, kick the corporate lobbyists out of DC and into the streets.
White-collar crimes, The Enron scandal that took peoples whole life savings an example of hows things have gotten out of hand. All politicains seem to get get the hands dirty in one way or another at one time or another. The more money you have the more you want,greed has no conscious. The more money you have the more suttle ways things can get covered up. Medical schemes, insurance frauds, no dlfferent then going down the styreet and using a gun to rob a bank.
White Collar crimes have been happing for a long time, since Enron the world just have a brighter view of it now. You would think that if you are in a postion on a job, were you have the up most respect that you could at least act in such a manner that you should. I look at it like this we say the poor get prison and rich get richer, well sometime if we dig a little dipper we would find that alot of the rich have more problems then the poor. They just have the money to get themsleves out of it.
I am very encouraged by the establishment and maintenance of the Corporate Crime Report. Since changing my major to Criminal Justice I have always been interested white collar crime. To me, white collar crime is a vast frontier that is waiting to be conquered. Now is the time to introduce new theories, regulations, and protective measure towards corporate crime. Mass man does not realize how much more damaging corporate crime is in relation to street crime. Society does not normally view millionaires are criminal master minds who murder, assault, and bribe. The criminal justice system needs to start pumping money into combating white collar crime now, so that we many begin to turn the tide as quickly as possible.
Corporate crime is a huge issue today but I think that it is that way because it can be. One reason would be that big businesses set the bar for other smaller businesses and how they run. Just like the upper class to the lower class, they make the laws and the smaller businesses get into trouble for that law or example. A second reason for them getting away with what they do for so long is that the public usually does not know or understand how a business actually works and we trust that these businesses are doing the right thing. I think society puts too much faith in big time CEO's because in the end they are human and they want to get ahead as much as any other person does. The only difference is that they have the means to do it with a big name or label to back them up. Third reason would be because there are educated people that are doing these crimes and as a natural instinct, we trust educated people and do not view them as criminal like society would with an uneducated business owner. It is a very sad concept but I do believe that it is the truth.
White Collar Crime is a major issue that is occurring today that a lot of people don’t know about. People are victims of white collar crime but they don’t realize it because they are uninformed and it’s not considered a major crime. White collar crime is not reported and there is no research on it because the government won’t fund it. White collar crime is considered to be boring so why fund research for something that’s not interesting. The fact of the matter is white collar crime is a serious issue and everybody falls victim to it. People need to become informed and knowledgeable so they can report it when it occurs. If we don’t white collar crime will still occur.
This article was extremely interesting....I loved how the writer compared the white collar crimes to that of street crimes. It was a real eye opener, espeically to people like me who didn't even really know much about white collar crime. I definitely agree with the write in the fact that something needs to be done to proactively combat the crimes that are taking place against all of us citizens. The health care fraud death number was astonishing compared to the number of murders per year....something needs to change otherwise more helpless people will lose their jobs, or even worse, their lives due to white collar crime.
corporate crime isnt gang related per say except that both happen in highly organized business type settings, gangsters dont wear a suit to work, but they do run a business. white collar crime is now being compared to street crime, i think it is about time. the offenders need to be treated the same as well, white collar crime is running rampant and taking a proactive approach would help,but of course the big question is what can be done prior to the crime being committed? its not like walmart where you put up a few camera's to keep people from shoplifting, however it does keep employee theft down as well, but would that work across the board? that is the big question, of course more oversite, lesss power per person would help as well.
Corporate White collar crimes are what make the average tax payer end up with higher taxes. White collar crime happens every day in society it's just on a hush hush basis and unless it ends up being a huge ordeal then it's still usually not heard about... The average petty thief gets caught and goes to jail for oh, depending on the theft 2-25 year, the average white collar embezzler... depending on who they go to bed and who has their hans in their pockets usually gets off with a slap on the wrist and large fines which with all the money they've accumulated over the years is nothing and the bottom line the TAX PAYER is the one who really gets to pay for it!! Our country's CURRENT ECONOMIC CRISIS IS A PRIME EXAMPLE OF THIS!!
Now that we know the top 20 things we need to know about white collar crime, what can we actually do about it on an individual basis. It seems like just about everyone has been a victim of white collar crime, most of us unknowingly on at least a small scale. Only the larger corporations like Enron come to the light via the media. If we really start actively prosecuting white collar crimes, how much jail time if any will they receive, if any? If someone murders one person they may probably receive life in prison. Not so for someone who commits a white collar crime. So they don't like probation! Who does? Just send them to prison for a LONG time!
White-collar crime happen because of society's indifference towards the offense. We feel the effects in a minimal way. For example, in a home improvement scheme, the homeowner will not bother to research the company thoroughly. And in large corporations so much power is given to one person. I know some companies have boards to make decisions but regardless there is always one to make the final decision. Again the people need to be more involved in what companies they do dealings with. White-Collar crime is not an area common to me so I may be making comments that sound far-fetched. Greed is the root of all evil. Plus the government does not step in until something drastic happens. There is weak law enforcement in white-collar crimes.
Violent crimes are often considered to be more harmful to society than white collar crimes. White collar crimes in my opinion are more harmful to society than other crimes. White collar criminals are able to get away with their crimes because they have the wealth, power, and prestige that the lower class do not have access to. White collar crime will continue to go on because it is not prosecuted like other crime even though the dollar amount that white collar crimes costs society greatly out numbers other crimes combined.
Taking into great consideration that my knowledge on white-collar crime was limited before reading this very interesting article, I must say that, I am not in any way pleased with learning that these crimes are so costly and not commonly punished. It seems to me that white collar crimes, are more destructive to society than regular street crimes. Obviously, I am not saying that the losses of one type of crime or the other are less important, but overall, it seems that if white collar crime didn’t exist or occurred less frequently, then, there would be more money circulating in our economy, and although steeling one penny from each individual is not that meaningful, stealing one penny from many individuals at a gigantic number creates a great loss for society as a whole, and a great gain, that most people will not be bothered by, for one very sneaky white collar criminal.
Again I agree with Karla. There is so much money wasted on White collar crime. We need to find better ways to catch these perps. This money could be going to school and useful things. Our tax money is being used for this and this angers me and wish there was more I could do as an individual. After reading about the agreements they now have for white collar crime makes me think is the whole government or however you want to call it, the "system" might be a better word. But it makes me think that the "system" is flawed. Maybe the whole system is committing a white collar crime by doing all this. A slap on the wrist and a fine. Well what about everyday criminals that are in jail, they don't get a slap on the wrist and get to say they will change. Its an unfair system and something should be done and maybe like the article says, "call 611." If it were that easy maybe we wouldn't be losing so much money on white collar crimes. And when it comes down to it, to even convict a company or person of a white collar crime you need "butt-loads" of evidence to back up any allegations you have toward them. I'm not sure if this information was told to everyone, that they would care. One main reason these things happen is because people don't care or let these crimes happen. It's upsetting to me, and if I go into some field in white collar crime I will make sure I make a difference.
The only thing I got from this article is that if I’m going to be a criminal. Do it while wearing an expensive suit. It’s sad that money can and power can get you out of trouble in America. I’m sure that idea came to light when JP Moran bailed out the Us government and then tried to over throw the government some years later.
Corporate crime is out of control. Reading the article on Goldman Sacs is just an example of how bad it is. I feel victimized because corporate crime has effected my savings, retirement and future. BUT, part of corporate crime is our fault as well. Do employees take the risk of "telling"? If the corp. is returning a profit and I gain from it, do I care? Is it only when "we" feel it, that it is wrong. I do believe we are seeing how corporate crime is starting to effect everyone; because it is starting to hit everyone in the pocket book, from insurance premium increases due to fraud, to Goldman Sachs and the stock market crash. Ethics are beginning to be taught again in classrooms, but is it too late? Can morales and ethics find a place in the corporate world again? I hope so! But the cost of prosecuting and housing criminals will be enormous and are we ready to accept responsiblity for it. As Emile Durkeim (sociologist) stated "crime is functional and is necessary for a society to progress because it may lead to needed social change". Apparantly our society needs to change to protect our future.
ReplyDeleteLet me start off by saying this is kind of funny in a since because you would be led to believe that the higher you are up in society the more civilized people would act. However we all know this is not true if anything there is more under handed things going on in the higher society. Corporate crimes are everywhere we look and how is it that we are surprised that companies are getting away will millions if not billions of dollars, sometime we ask for it i.e. automobile companies. Automobile companies do not care if people get hurt from vehicles they created as long as they can see that dollar bill at the end of the day. It’s like being in a gang, the man at the top will remain at the top because he uses others to do his dirty work that is till someone blows the whistle/ snitches or they slip up. A crime has to hurt someone regardless if it’s present or long term. Besides it’s not like if someone get in trouble for a corporate crime they will go to jail most of them pay their way out of trouble, it’s like releasing a gang member back into the streets they are more likely to repeat their actions to end up right back in jail, why is it that we don’t see this and change the rule. I’m just saying if I had a chose to commit a crime it would be a corporate crime because it would be like a slap on the wrist.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with your statement that corporate crime is partly our fault because sometime there are red flags that we chose to ignore, just like the cartoon sometime we put up our blinders to the situation at hand. But to answer your question about morals and ethics in the corporation world, I feel there is no room for ethics and morals because it’s all about how the corporation can make fast cash with doing as little work as possible. That’s not saying there aren’t people or corporations who genuinely care for others it’s just they are over shadowed by the ones who don’t care.
The above cartoon appears to be a reflection of Richard Quinney and Marshall Clinard’s opinion. These sociologists believe the definition of white collar crime should have sub categories or sub types such as business, organizational, government, corporate, and occupational crimes. The general population is naïve in thinking that white collar crime is a new phenomenon; remember the terminology and definition of white collar crime by Edwin Sutherland was introduced in 1939. David Simon believes the name should be changed to Elite Defiance.
ReplyDeleteI believe we wrongly believe the upper strata of society possess some intrinsic high ethical standard. The promotion of this idealism is by the upper strata, and they want us to believe they are beyond reproach. This false idealistic ethic was employed by Kenneth Lay at Enron. These criminals such as Lay, Bernard Madoff, and others somehow convince themselves the rules do not apply to them. They are criminals that possess a manipulative charm. They know that the chances of being caught is minimal and usually the punishment lenient. The quest for power, money, influence or some other personal gain is great. We want to believe these guys and that is why the estimate of white collar crime is only a portion of the extent of the crime because the majority of the victims never realize that they have been cheated.
The major problem with Corporations is that they know they can get away with it, and that in a few years the American public will have forgotten about the “incident”. Like it says in the article, “Now, corporate criminals don’t have to worry about pleading guilty to crimes. Three new loopholes have developed over the past five years – the deferred prosecution agreement, the non prosecution agreement, and pleading guilty a closet entity or a defunct entity that has nothing to lose.” They plead out or come clean on their own and wow, maybe they do care about what is happening. Let’s face it, no cooperate America does not care about the general public; it is all about the all mighty dollar. As we remember with the Ford Pinto, Ford decided it was cheaper to pay off the accident victims and their families than to recall and repair the problem. Yet most of today’s generation could not even tell you what the Pinto incident was about.
ReplyDeleteThen there are the American people who turn a blind eye to the occurrences, I mean really, just because a large cooperation, or even a small one, donates 5% of it’s yearly profits to a worthy cause should we ignore what they are doing to our environment, to our children, to our lives and to our freedom? Take the BP incident for instance, yes they have been fined, and yes they were made to assist in the clean up of the Glue region, but some governmental entities and even scientists are raving about how the spilled oil has caused the rapid growth of “oil eating” bacteria and micro-organisms in the that area. So now we have to worry about what the possible side effects of these bacteria and organisms are to the environment. Will BP be held responsible for the damage done by the organisms spawned from this spill in say 20 or 30 years? Or will the next generation of people have forgotten about the cause of the growth of these organisms?
I see white collar corporate crime as the "politically correct" way to manipulate others to get what you want. Whether it be politician, corporate executives or a member of middle/upper class america. It just doesn't look as messy and coniving to steal from others quietly. The ones involved in this type of crime do not see the grand effects they have on the ones they leave behind. They are egotistical and think of noone but themselves. When you look at the difference in punishment between a petty thief or an "upstanding" corporate executive who cleans hard working americans out of millions of dollars, you can see what is advocated by our justice system and media to be the worst criminals in our society. It is very scary because it shows the depiction of what we consider to be a thief. If you were to line up an upstanding Harvard graduate, corporate executive along side an uneducated career thief, which would you be ready to prosecute? Then what would you do when you find out the career petty thief had affected society by about $3000 in his whole criminal career, but the corporate executive had effected thousands of people and gained millions of dollars (and I'm not even talking about the loss of lives)? My guess would be the thief is in prison for life (no worries for society anymore) and the executive is floating on a yacht (oh, he paid about $25,000 in restitution). GET REAL!
ReplyDeleteLessons learned from this article: politics is a dirty game, corporate crime will get your hands dirty, corporate crime is being legalized, and if you want to prosecute it you'll be a very poor person. So to break all that down I'll go point by point. Politics is a dirty game: as the article points out to gain rank in politics go after corporate crime, but once you make it steer clear, make nice with the suits and go after street crime. Corporate crime will get your hands dirty: whether you were the one that actually poured the chemicals into the water or the one who signed off on it, in the end you're still just as guilty as the person(s) who did the act. Corporate crime is being legalized: in the mafia, in petty crime, one doesn't have any pull on legislation, but if you're a corporation with lobbyists working for you, it's scary but you can influence legislation. And lastly, if you want to prosecute corporate crime, you'll be a very poor person: who's going to support you, certainly not the corporations racking in the big bucks from their crimes. I think I'll stick with the church...nothing illegal ever happens there...they're not a corporation...or are they?
ReplyDeletePeople are afraid of big business. Big business has their hands in everything. They have some much power and control that they are under prosecuted and get away with countless crimes. As stated in the article and having learned this in many of Greg’s class- Corporate crime causes more harm and damage on society than all street crime combined, even murder. This is astonishing. It is weird to hear the term corporate murder but the reality is that it does happen every day, as stated in the article, but they are rarely prosecuted. Even when they are prosecuted they have loopholes that are basically slaps on the hand. How is this justice? How is this acceptable? Something must be done. Big business should not influence how a country is run and should not get away with what they are getting away with.
ReplyDeleteCorporate crime to me is the worst crime because it’s the class of crime that indirectly effects every individual in the respected area. Corporate crime alone can cost Americans easily over 500 billion dollars a year. Where in street crimes account to 3.8 billion dollars a year. The horrible part of corporate crime is that the government doesn’t pass legislation for harsher punishments for corporate criminals. Charging them with civil actions hardly get the point across to not do it again. For example, Toyota, Toyota in 2009 needed all of their vehicles to be returned because of some malfunction that was causing accidents and deaths. Though Rudolph Giuliani was the an U.S. Attorney and prosecuted corporate crimes which was a good deed, however what I don’t agree with is the reason why; to gain political power, not for the improvement of society and civilization. If Rudy Giuliani for example, stood up not only to convict violators but would have summited to congress legislation for harsher punishments not only for the nation but for the state of New York then the annual death rate for Corporate crime would be lower than 16,000. There are no incentives for these corporations to change some regulations they have because if the government doesn’t deem it fit to care about its citizens and or the people who are negatively affected then why change?
ReplyDeleteCorporate Crime is very popular especially because of the people who commit it. These types of crimes are normally done by people who have a high position in our society. I think more people should be prosecuted because not only does it affect the corporation but also the victim's of the crime. There are so many types of corporate crime and the one that stands out to me the most are the governmental crimes. These types of crimes are just shocking to me because the government is suppose to protects it's citizens not cause them harm. For example, what is going on in Sudan that is a major governmental crime because the government is providing the armys the weapons to destroy it's people. I think something should seriously be done about that because innocent people are losing their lives because of GREED by it's own government.
ReplyDeleteIf corporate crime makes more damage than street crime towards society, then who can we really trust but ourselves. SCREW being scared to walk to my car at night or the safety of my belongings in the “hood”. I should just re-route my scary nature to the people that have a great amount of “say-so” over my everyday life! They want to go around blaming all of the crime, violence, and chaos in the Crips, thugs, bloods, and the gangstas! Probably to only keep the citizens attention off of all the things they are hiding from us day to day.
ReplyDeleteIt’s hard enough as it is to get health care. So when health care fraud is one of the 20 things to know about corporate crime and it’s costing Americans 100 billion to 400 billion a year behind their stupid mistakes, you can’t help but be scared for the safety and health care of the million of American families.
This statement came to my attention as I read the article. “For every company convicted of health care fraud, there are hundreds of others who get away with ripping off Medicare and Medicaid, or face only a mild slap-on-the-wrist fines and civil penalties when caught.” After reading this I immediately became upset! I myself an battling with Medicaid and Medicare and while I sit back and struggle trying to figure out how I am going to be able to pay for my next prescription of insulin and the other millions of people (Cancer patients with their kimo & people with heart problems and their heart medications, and millions of other people with medical issues), those BONEHEADS are playing around! And it’s absolutely absurd that when they get caught they only get put in “timeout” with a slap on the wrist?! They better hope I don’t get anywhere close to finding out who they are because if I do, then its going to be a mistake.
I tried calling 611 when Enron was in business but I received a busy signal. I agree with this article strongly, we the American Public entrusted our government to regulate Corporate America, but little did we know that the ones that were supposed to be regulating were the ones who were actually committing the crimes, "Goldman Sachs".
ReplyDeleteI would always try to debate with the general public on which type of crime cause more harm, Criminal or Corporate? Before the stock markets crashed and millions of people lost their homes and jobs, the average person would say that Criminal would cause more harm. But since the public received a so called "dose of reality", they seem to have a sudden change of heart. Companies who destroy lives by fraudulent investments should receive longer prison sentences and not in a Federal Prison but a State Prison. The problem is the way our judicial system is set up, big time corporations can offered top lawyers who look for so called loopholes. You can commit any type of crime and get away with it just as long as you can offered it. I think that after the so called "Recession" is over, Congress will implicate tougher guidelines on how Corporate America works, and if anything this should be a HUGE WAKE UP CALL. Corporate/White Collar Crimes should be taken seriously, these types of crimes brought America and the World down to their knees.
Bernie, and a host of other confidence schemers are always looking to bilk the unsuspecting. The main target is the elderly who have built up a nice nest egg and want to make it stretch a bit farther. They buy into the plan and before they realize it everything they thought they had is gone. Enron was a prime example of corporate greed and deception, victimizing countless families. I thought it was a nice touch that Martha Stewart was locked up for insider trading. An example, yes, yet is has not deterred this practice just made it go a little deeper the hide it better. Corporate criminals should be treated as murders and grand theft, because of their actions they have destroyed families and driven others to take their own lives, all the ramifications of their greedy unethical business practices should fall squarely on the people who initiated and the people who carried out the deception. A little ZERO tollerence.
ReplyDeleteYour place settings in society are irrelevant, no matter where you are standing on the society scale, there is always crime and you will receive and not receive a certain amount of respect from a certain type of people. Pertaining to corporate crimes, the crime rate is high, that should come as a shock to people considering those individuals are placed in a position where they have the ability to reap the benefits of a higher stand point. The only difference from this crime and other crimes is its manipulation of the law. Corporations, because of their hierarchy position in society, the corporation can yield peoples say in the crime being committed. People that are subjected to this crime and suffer from it normally get paid to keep quiet or other tactics the company may use. That’s just covering the money side of things. People can lose their life or a life of a love one over, not just this crime, but any crime. However, unlike corporate crimes, those other crimes don’t have the resources or connections to say their favor in a greater advantage. The connections that other lower class crimes lack. As for the law standing, it’s not illegal, what they do some of the times and there are less prosecutors against corporate crimes.
ReplyDelete"Corporate crime is often violent crime.
ReplyDeleteRecite this list of corporate frauds and people will immediately say to you: but you can't compare street crime and corporate crime – corporate crime is not violent crime.
Not true.
Corporate crime is often violent crime.
The FBI estimates that, 16,000 Americans are murdered every year.
Compare this to the 56,000 Americans who die every year on the job or from occupational diseases such as black lung and asbestosis and the tens of thousands of other Americans who fall victim to the silent violence of pollution, contaminated foods, hazardous consumer products, and hospital malpractice.
These deaths are often the result of criminal recklessness. Yet, they are rarely prosecuted as homicides or as criminal violations of federal laws."
Corporate crime is not viewed as a violent crime because when it is reported by the media, it's not gory and bloody like a murder. The shock value isn't there in the story. Now, if corporate executives were on the sidewalk killing off their slackers, sure, that's a great story!
"Corporations love deferred prosecution agreements.
In the 1990s, if prosecutors had evidence of a crime, they would bring a criminal charge against the corporation and sometimes against the individual executives. And the company would end up pleading guilty.
Then, about three years ago, the Justice Department said – hey, there is this thing called a deferred prosecution agreement.
We can bring a criminal charge against the company. And we will tell the company – if you are a good company and do not violate the law for the next two years, we will drop the charges. No harm, no foul. This is called a deferred prosecution agreement.
And most major corporate crime prosecutions are brought this way now. The company pays a fine. The company is charged with a crime. But there is no conviction. And after two or three years, depending on the term of the agreement, the charges are dropped."
OSHA also falls into this category. There is a company in North Carolina, House of Raeford. House of Raeford showed HUGE improvements in their job safety records. Why? Because they were falsified. They would intimidate their workers into NOT reporting their injuries. Sadly, most of these workers didn't speak English very well and were in desperate need of their income to support their families. In some cases, when an injured employee would return to work in the same day as their injury because they would be afraid of losing their job. When safety reports for companies are low, OSHA doesn't inspect as often. I suppose this is a corporate reward.
There is so much money paying off corporate attorneys, that defeating seems impossible. The battle needs to start at the top, kick the corporate lobbyists out of DC and into the streets.
White-collar crimes, The Enron scandal that took peoples whole life savings an example of hows things have gotten out of hand. All politicains seem to get get the hands dirty in one way or another at one time or another. The more money you have the more you want,greed has no conscious. The more money you have the more suttle ways things can get covered up. Medical schemes, insurance frauds, no dlfferent then going down the styreet and using a gun to rob a bank.
ReplyDeleteWhite Collar crimes have been happing for a long time, since Enron the world just have a brighter view of it now. You would think that if you are in a postion on a job, were you have the up most respect that you could at least act in such a manner that you should. I look at it like this we say the poor get prison and rich get richer, well sometime if we dig a little dipper we would find that alot of the rich have more problems then the poor. They just have the money to get themsleves out of it.
ReplyDeleteI am very encouraged by the establishment and maintenance of the Corporate Crime Report. Since changing my major to Criminal Justice I have always been interested white collar crime. To me, white collar crime is a vast frontier that is waiting to be conquered. Now is the time to introduce new theories, regulations, and protective measure towards corporate crime. Mass man does not realize how much more damaging corporate crime is in relation to street crime. Society does not normally view millionaires are criminal master minds who murder, assault, and bribe. The criminal justice system needs to start pumping money into combating white collar crime now, so that we many begin to turn the tide as quickly as possible.
ReplyDeleteCorporate crime is a huge issue today but I think that it is that way because it can be. One reason would be that big businesses set the bar for other smaller businesses and how they run. Just like the upper class to the lower class, they make the laws and the smaller businesses get into trouble for that law or example. A second reason for them getting away with what they do for so long is that the public usually does not know or understand how a business actually works and we trust that these businesses are doing the right thing. I think society puts too much faith in big time CEO's because in the end they are human and they want to get ahead as much as any other person does. The only difference is that they have the means to do it with a big name or label to back them up. Third reason would be because there are educated people that are doing these crimes and as a natural instinct, we trust educated people and do not view them as criminal like society would with an uneducated business owner. It is a very sad concept but I do believe that it is the truth.
ReplyDeleteWhite Collar Crime is a major issue that is occurring today that a lot of people don’t know about. People are victims of white collar crime but they don’t realize it because they are uninformed and it’s not considered a major crime. White collar crime is not reported and there is no research on it because the government won’t fund it. White collar crime is considered to be boring so why fund research for something that’s not interesting. The fact of the matter is white collar crime is a serious issue and everybody falls victim to it. People need to become informed and knowledgeable so they can report it when it occurs. If we don’t white collar crime will still occur.
ReplyDeleteThis article was extremely interesting....I loved how the writer compared the white collar crimes to that of street crimes. It was a real eye opener, espeically to people like me who didn't even really know much about white collar crime. I definitely agree with the write in the fact that something needs to be done to proactively combat the crimes that are taking place against all of us citizens. The health care fraud death number was astonishing compared to the number of murders per year....something needs to change otherwise more helpless people will lose their jobs, or even worse, their lives due to white collar crime.
ReplyDeletecorporate crime isnt gang related per say except that both happen in highly organized business type settings, gangsters dont wear a suit to work, but they do run a business. white collar crime is now being compared to street crime, i think it is about time. the offenders need to be treated the same as well, white collar crime is running rampant and taking a proactive approach would help,but of course the big question is what can be done prior to the crime being committed? its not like walmart where you put up a few camera's to keep people from shoplifting, however it does keep employee theft down as well, but would that work across the board? that is the big question, of course more oversite, lesss power per person would help as well.
ReplyDeleteCorporate White collar crimes are what make the average tax payer end up with higher taxes. White collar crime happens every day in society it's just on a hush hush basis and unless it ends up being a huge ordeal then it's still usually not heard about... The average petty thief gets caught and goes to jail for oh, depending on the theft 2-25 year, the average white collar embezzler... depending on who they go to bed and who has their hans in their pockets usually gets off with a slap on the wrist and large fines which with all the money they've accumulated over the years is nothing and the bottom line the TAX PAYER is the one who really gets to pay for it!! Our country's CURRENT ECONOMIC CRISIS IS A PRIME EXAMPLE OF THIS!!
ReplyDeleteNow that we know the top 20 things we need to know about white collar crime, what can we actually do about it on an individual basis. It seems like just about everyone has been a victim of white collar crime, most of us unknowingly on at least a small scale. Only the larger corporations like Enron come to the light via the media. If we really start actively prosecuting white collar crimes, how much jail time if any will they receive, if any? If someone murders one person they may probably receive life in prison. Not so for someone who commits a white collar crime. So they don't like probation! Who does? Just send them to prison for a LONG time!
ReplyDeleteWhite-collar crime happen because of society's indifference towards the offense. We feel the effects in a minimal way. For example, in a home improvement scheme, the homeowner will not bother to research the company thoroughly. And in large corporations so much power is given to one person. I know some companies have boards to make decisions but regardless there is always one to make the final decision. Again the people need to be more involved in what companies they do dealings with. White-Collar crime is not an area common to me so I may be making comments that sound far-fetched. Greed is the root of all evil. Plus the government does not step in until something drastic happens. There is weak law enforcement in white-collar crimes.
ReplyDeleteViolent crimes are often considered to be more harmful to society than white collar crimes. White collar crimes in my opinion are more harmful to society than other crimes. White collar criminals are able to get away with their crimes because they have the wealth, power, and prestige that the lower class do not have access to. White collar crime will continue to go on because it is not prosecuted like other crime even though the dollar amount that white collar crimes costs society greatly out numbers other crimes combined.
ReplyDeleteTaking into great consideration that my knowledge on white-collar crime was limited before reading this very interesting article, I must say that, I am not in any way pleased with learning that these crimes are so costly and not commonly punished. It seems to me that white collar crimes, are more destructive to society than regular street crimes. Obviously, I am not saying that the losses of one type of crime or the other are less important, but overall, it seems that if white collar crime didn’t exist or occurred less frequently, then, there would be more money circulating in our economy, and although steeling one penny from each individual is not that meaningful, stealing one penny from many individuals at a gigantic number creates a great loss for society as a whole, and a great gain, that most people will not be bothered by, for one very sneaky white collar criminal.
ReplyDeleteAgain I agree with Karla. There is so much money wasted on White collar crime. We need to find better ways to catch these perps. This money could be going to school and useful things. Our tax money is being used for this and this angers me and wish there was more I could do as an individual. After reading about the agreements they now have for white collar crime makes me think is the whole government or however you want to call it, the "system" might be a better word. But it makes me think that the "system" is flawed. Maybe the whole system is committing a white collar crime by doing all this. A slap on the wrist and a fine. Well what about everyday criminals that are in jail, they don't get a slap on the wrist and get to say they will change. Its an unfair system and something should be done and maybe like the article says, "call 611." If it were that easy maybe we wouldn't be losing so much money on white collar crimes. And when it comes down to it, to even convict a company or person of a white collar crime you need "butt-loads" of evidence to back up any allegations you have toward them. I'm not sure if this information was told to everyone, that they would care. One main reason these things happen is because people don't care or let these crimes happen. It's upsetting to me, and if I go into some field in white collar crime I will make sure I make a difference.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing I got from this article is that if I’m going to be a criminal. Do it while wearing an expensive suit. It’s sad that money can and power can get you out of trouble in America. I’m sure that idea came to light when JP Moran bailed out the Us government and then tried to over throw the government some years later.
ReplyDeleteHow To Marry a Corporation CLICK HERE for video
ReplyDeleteYou should marry a corporation because corporations will screw you all the time. Godly Republican Frank Abrams legally married a corporation!