Here’s the reading due by start of class on Thursday:
- Does crime pay? Why, or why not? What are the costs / benefits of committing crimes?
- What new laws would you propose in order to deal with the overcrowding of prisons?
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Here’s the reading due by start of class on Thursday:
22 replies on “Reading: Crime and Punishment”
Crime doesn’t really pay unless you can rob a place and not get caught. Some benefits of committing crime is free money and other things, like tv’s. Some costs of committing a crime could be jail time and loss of your whole life. Most criminals believe that a theft of money gets about the same sentence in jail, so they might as well steal as much money as they can.
To deal with prison overcrowding I would probably make a law that only a certain number of prioners are allowed in one prison. For example, there could be only 10 prisoners per 1,000 sq. feet or something like that.
1. One benefit to committing a crime is that you don’t have to worry about much in prison-you are given shelter, food, and clothes, and you do not have to work or do anything if you don’t want to. In prison you can just sit there all day and let the tax payers take care of you, there is no pressure of taking care of kids, paying bills, etc. Another benefit is what you get if your crime is successful and you don’t get cost, which in most cases is a lot of money. A cost to committing a crime is imprisonment= loss of freedom. You cannot do anything on your own and you are constantly under serveillance. You are also trapped in a small area and cannot leave or see people, except during restricted hours. I believe crime doesn’t pay, no money is worth spending years in jail.
2. In order to bring down the overcrowding in prisons, I suggest setting a minimum crime and money amount in order to determine who is sent to prison. If someone is not stealing for the money and just get trapped into problems, prison is not neccessary. Many people each year are sent to prison because of legal issues they get caught in and had no intention of causing. But if someone is deliberately trying to rob a bank or steal a car at gun-point, they should be sent to prison. Anyone using violence to commit crimes should be sent to prison over harmless individuals in order to bring down the overcrowding of prisons.
1. Crime doesn’t pay because, like the example in the reading, whether you steal $5 or $500, you still get punished the same amount of prison time for committing a felony. Costs of committing crimes are clearly jail time, family problems, and ruining your record. Also, the article said that increasing the amount of police actually increases the amount of crime in an area. I think that this is just showing that in an area with a super high crime rate, putting more police there doesn’t put it under control. It simply just adds more police to catch more people continuously doing bad things and crimes. Benefits of committing a crime are good to police whose rates of handling crime increase.
2. A law that one could propose to deal with overcrowding of prisons is to make less extreme crimes have to do more community service and just pay fines instead of serving jail time. If you are caught harmlessly stealing say, an item from a store, it should be up to the store whether they want you to pay it back, pay a fine as well, or perhaps have to donate some of their time to a store. This is just a small example because overcrowding seems to be so large of a problem that making a rule for one crime most likely won’t solve it.
I personally believe that crime does not pay off. Let’s say you rob a bank, the chances of you getting away with it are very slim to none at all, and even if you do get away with it, you will always be looking over your shoulder and being. A benefit of robbing a bank is that you can get a ton of money, and you can live “the high life” for a few days, until you get caught. This would be one of the costs to robbing a bank, the fact that you will be caught and put into prison for a long time. Even if you aren’t caught, you will always feel guilty for something you should have been punished for.
To stop overcrowding in prisons, the government would have to set up laws to say how many prisoners are allowed to be in a certain facility. For example, you need so many square feet for each prisoner, kinda like what they do for horses and cattle, but instead prisoners.
It depends what you are stealing and if you get caught.If it is expensive and you know you can get away it might pay off in the end. The costs are really based on what or how much you steal. That determines your punishment. The benefits are if you get away and don’t get in trouble you end up with money or a good you weren’t looking to receive.
There really isn’t a way to make a law to deal with overcrowding of prisons. One way would be, if they have life in prison, why keep them there? Its more efficient to just kill them. Why use up one prison cell if they are just going to rot in the prison to begin with. That would make some space. The only other way to deal with it is to let some go. But if you do that its pretty much slapping a kid’s hand and telling them not to do it anymore and as you may know, that normally stops them for awhile but then they are going to eventually do that again. There is no real way to dealing with this problem.
Depends on what is taken and if you need it to live or how long will it last. If someone kills someone they wanted to for the longest time then they maybe feel good about themselves which would be a benefit in a bad way. A cost for it would be the damage put on the family and possibly get found out by the cops and going to jail for a very long time and maybe dying in jail. Keep cameras in their houses to see if they are up to something strange make certain prisoners be put on house arrest or make those people go to intervention and that to help them with the process of not committing a crime. there is really no way to say that someone won’t do it again but you never know all you can do is push them ion the right direction and hope they learn from what they did
I think on depending on where you live and under certain circumstances, crime does pay. In some areas of the country there are very few police officers, like in Omaha. So in places like that crime does pay because there is a very slim chance that you will get caught. But in other areas like Detroit, crime doesn’t pay because there are so many police officers that you will get caught. Some benefits though, if you do get caught and you are poor, then you have a roof over your head, food to eat, and you are being protected by guards.
A new law I would suggest for the overcrowding of prisons is to prioritize who should be in prison. For example, a repeat offender should probably get more prison time than a person who committed a crime for the first time, but only if its the same crime.
1. I don’t really understand what you mean by “Does crime pay?” If you mean does crime pay a price, I think yes. If you do something bad, obviously you’re going to be punished for it. I agree with the reading how it says if someone stole $5 vs. someone who stole $50,000, their punishments would be different. I believe you’re punished to help you learn a lesson. People who commit serious crimes need a hard and serious punishment to help them learn not to do it again. It’s just like teaching young children not to do something: not to touch a burning stove, or not listening to their parents. For example, their first punishment of touching a burning stove is obviously hurting themselves. Parents can then punish even more to really make sure their kids know not to do that again. I think learning a lesson is a benefit of committing a crime. If it’s a small crime, like a child burning themselves, doing it once will make them not do it again. For more serious crimes, like murder, I think not only do they need punishment, but the person may not be altogether mentally which is why they committed the crime. I think some professional assistance could really help a person with that serious of a crime on their hands. The costs are obviously the possibility of going to jail, paying a lot of money (which you may not have) and having your family disappointed in you. For me personally I’d rather have a punishment than having my parents disappointed in me; it’s one of the worst feelings in the world.
2. Even though it’s a prison, I think people needed to be treated somewhat fairly. I believe prison should almost be like college: 2-4 people to a room (like a dorm), with their own bathroom, or share one per floor. I think they should be kept clean and sanitary, and healthy food options. Even though a prisoner might have committed a serious crime, he/she is still a person too. I’m not saying let them eat all they want, but don’t just give them a slice of bread and water. I think all people get somewhat claustrophobic, and having too many people in one room can really scare people. They’re already away from their families, no need to keep so many people in one room.
In my opinion, no crime doesn’t pay. The only benefit of committing a crime, such as burglary, would be gaining a possession that you wouldn’t have been able to own before. The costs to committing said crime though would be the risks of getting caught and arrested, the hassles of going through trials, and the potential of being put in jail. On top of all that, the item you originally stole will be taken out of your possession. So no, I don’t believe crime pays. As for the issue of overcrowding prisons, it’s hard to say what you can do about it. The only thing I can really think of would be harsher punishments, to hopefully thwart some potential criminals. Other than that, I’m not sure because you can’t give criminals less jail times for their actions and put them right back in the streets. Also I know that their are many suicides and homicides that go on in the overcrowded prisons, so that does weed out a few criminals. But that isn’t a good solution to the problem either.
1. Crime does pay. Increase in crime causes the increase of demand for police officers and other potential job opportunities. Also, not only are these officers and other crime fighters making the profit from their career choice, but they are also creating a profit by preventing crimes and saving our country hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses. The costs of committing crimes are clearly the risk a person runs of getting caught and having to serve punishment time. Another cost is that in taking part in a crime, that person contributes to the number of crimes that could cause the increase of police force to increase as well. The benefits of committing crime, of course, would be the profit you make from said crime or the achievment of necessities, such as food, clothes, etc. Also, there could be personal incentives of the committer of the crime, such as personal revenge.
2. Laws that should be put in place would include something like an increase of police force, this way the number of crimes committed would decrease and therefore the number of people needed to be convicted to prison time would decrease. Also, other laws that could be put in place could be laws that deal more with the core cause of certain crimes. For example, how the gap of incomes is what causes most robberies. A law or some sort of regulations could be put in place in order to better supervise the social differences within a certain area.
1. I believe that crime does pay. Crime pays because it raises the amount of job opportunities that there are open for jobs like police officers and fire fighters and jobs like that. Which also gives these people money to feed their families. The benefits of commiting crime would be that the people who do the crime, get the necesities that they needed. Costs of commiting crime would be the risk that they could get caught or hurt during the process.
2. Some laws that should be made should be the legalization of drugs. I think that a lot of people in prison are there for either dealing drugs or being in possestion of drugs. So, if drugs become legalized, it would drastically decrease the amount of criminals that are overcrowding the prisons.
1) In a way crime does pay, when there is crime there is a demand for more police and other protective services would go up, and for the individual taking part in the crime they might obtain essential services to live such as food and clothing. Costs would be the high possibility of going to jail as well as the standard of living in that area would decrease due to higher crime rate, and the benefit would be major street credit for the person performing the crime and another benefit would be more job openings to keep crime off the streets.
2) I would purpose that the number of police for a certain area increases as well as patrols so they could possibly stop crimes before they occur.
1.) I think crime does pay. When crime increases, the demand for police officers also increases. A cost is taking part in a crime and so that person adds to the number of crimes which results in the increase of police. Benefits of committing a crime would be the profit you make like food and clothes.
2.) To deal with the overcrowding of prisons, you could add more police officers would could help with the decrease of crimes. But on the other hand, I don’t necessarily believe that. I don’t feel as if there would be less crime just or more crime stopped because we have more officers. But it could be a start.
Crime pays and it doesn’t pay at the time. Having crime gives cities a reason to employ police officers. Also having the prisons is good for employing people to be guards. Also court cases help to pay District Attorneys, Defense Attorneys, Bailiffs, and Judges. However, A lot of the funds come out of tax payers’ dollars. It costs money to hold prisoners and to feed them and bathe them and to clothe them. Costs of committing crime are of course jail time, taxing the prison system, and possibly death. And benefits are the employment of law enforcement officials and legal counsel.
There are several news laws I would propose to deal with the overcrowding of prison and the cost of prisons and criminals: First, I would eliminate the “Life in prison w/ or w/o parole.” If your offense warrants that punishment, then its Death Penalty. I would also change the way of not giving people the death penalty. Instead of one person of a twelve person jury not agreeing with it, five people of the twelve must disagree with the death penalty. Also I would eliminate the long periods of time where people aren’t getting punished. I’d allow criminals 60 days to get their affairs in order, then they get killed by volunteer firing squad that supply their own ammunition. There are millions of people chomping at the bit to kill violent criminals.
I would also repeal laws banning the possession and use of narcotics, but uphold the ones for distributors and pardon the possessors, because drug offenders are a large percentage of the prison population, and no laws regarding drugs would reduce drug related crime and violent crimes. Therefore, there would be less prisoners and they wouldn’t be overcrowded.
Crime pays in the sense that the person doing the crime could get something from it like money or a car or the satisfaction in getting revenge. Some of the costs are being arrested, put in jail, and everything that is done that goes along with it. One of the major benefits are the person doing the crime gets something. Some other benefits are that the person may gain happiness from committing the crime. If I were to propose new laws in order to deal with the overcrowding of prisons, I would propose building more of them or even making them larger. Another thing that I would suggest would be to not keep people in jail that only did things like steal a car or rob a bank. Yes, those things are bad, but people like murderers or rapists are more important to keep in jail because they are more harmful to everyone. I would also suggest putting people that are in jail under house arrest or move them into other facilities besides the jail. Because whether they are in the jail or in their own home where they an’t leave, they are still being punished for the crime they committed.
1.) No, crime does not pay. For example, if someone robs a bank, they literally get paid. But majority of the time, they will get caught. The benefits of committing a crime is the loot that you obtain. The costs are conviction and being sent to prison.
2.)To deal with the overcrowding of prisons, I would propose that we release the non-life threatening people, but give them some other consequences, such as a fine or heavy probation. That way, they are still getting punished, but they don’t use up our tax dollars and there is more room for the murderers.
No, because when you commit a crime you lose everything that you get if you get caught. Some costs of committing a crime is getting caught and possibly going to jail if the trial doesn’t agree with you. Also many fees come along with that and you could lose some of your rights like voting if you are convicted. They only way you can benefit from a crime is if you do not get caught, but with the security most places have these days you are bound to get caught. I would lessen the conviction time on minor crimes, so that way they do not have to stay there as long and give up a space easier. I would vote for expanding jails in high crime rating areas or spend more money to the prevention of crime.
No, you cannot make living on crimes. You cant pay the bills by making crimes everyday. If you were to get caught then you will lose everything. Some benefits of commiting a crime is you get free stuff. You dont have to work like everyone else to get what you want. I wouldnt put any new laws into affected just better techonlogy. Make it hard for people to steal, more cameras in super markets, more police officers in banks. I think more advances in techology will scare some people not take commit crimes.
1. Yes crime does pay the cost of crime can be enormous. In one year crime costs US citizens $200 billion. The US only spends $100 billion a year on preventing crime. So crime makes around $100 billion dollars each year. Only the ones committing crimes benefit from it. The victims are sometimes left in a major debt.
2. To avoid over crowding prisons a law that i would propose is to fine the people that do little crimes but still pentalize the ones that make major crimes.
1. I think crime does pay. What I mean is when you live your life, you pay money for everything. But when you go to prison for doing something wrong, you pay the society by staying in prison and paying your time there.
2. What I would do with overcrowding prisons, I would either built another one or share cells. It would take less space and it would be more effiencent
1. Contrary to the beliefs of most criminals, crime doesn’t pay because, like the reading said, whether you steal $5 or $500, you still get punished the same amount of prison time for committing a felony. Costs of committing crimes are endless. Jail time and fees will lead to family problems as well as a bad record, making it difficult to get a good job. It simply just adds more police to catch more people continuously doing bad things and crimes. Benefits of committing a crime are good to police whose rates of handling crime increase.
2. One that should be implemented should be the legalization of marijuana. I think that a lot of people in prison are there for either dealing pot or being in possession of it. So, if drugs become legalized, it would drastically decrease the amount of criminals that are overcrowding the prisons.
I think it can to an extent. People do get stuff out of it, but it corrupts society. It like monkey see, monkey do. More young children are getting involved in crime now and more people are getting hurt. I don think crime pays. Some things are gained, but more are lost like lives and moral values. For over crowding in prison, I think there should be rules to a certain amount of people so everybody has their own space.