Crime Vs White Collar Crime

An aspect of crime that has made me think is the white collar versus street crime dynamic. Street crime is any criminal offense that typically takes place or originates in a public place. Street crime includes assault, sexual assault, homicide, robbery, and drug trafficking. In contrast, white-collar crime is non-violent crime committed by business or government professionals for financial gain. White-collar crime includes lying, cheating, stealing, fraud, embezzlement, forgery, and tax evasion. Street crime is public and is reported to the public, but white-collar crime is often done behind closed doors and is rarely discussed. Street crime usually involves spontaneous physical harm and violence, but white-collar crime involves premeditated manipulation.

Most people, when they hear the word “crime,” think about street crime or violent crime such as murder, rape, theft, or drugs. However, there is another type of crime that has cost people their life savings, investors’ billions of dollars, and has had significant impacts of multiple lives; it is called white collar crime. The Federal Bureau of Investigation defines white collar crime as

White-collar crimes are referred to as crimes that are financially motivated crimes and are usually committed by business and government professionals. As for corporate crimes they are crimes that are usually committed by a corporation or by an individual working for a corporation. Some people have argued that to many regulations can actually cause and increase in corporate misconduct. Regulations that are to complex, extensive, or outdated can actually lead an organization to disregard them there for it leads to intentionally breaking the law. It is important to be able to detect white-collar crimes and corporate crimes. Lack of understanding the economic and business stand point

White-collar crime is defined as the financial motivations of non-violent crimes that are committed by professionals of business and those of the government. In the field of criminology, Edwin Suthelan (1939), a socialist who was the first person to define white-collar crime as a crime that respectable and those people of higher social status commit. The crimes include those associated with fraud, bribery, embezzlement, cybercrime, money laundering, theft of the identity and many more crimes that are nonviolent. For the white collar crimes, the offenses committed should produce some gains financially. The crimes are thereby committed by those persons holding various positions in businesses or organizations, and it is because of this position they can gain access to amounts of huge money that they get from the people like customers with whom they serve. The criminals involved are not caught in activities that are violent, involved in drug issues or illegal activities.

When it comes to talking about crime and the different treatment of white-collar and blue-collar crime, there are three different perspectives. The first perspective is the functionalist perspective. The view of functionalism is defined as “Functionalism interprets each part of society in terms of how it contributes to the stability of the whole society. Society is more than the sum of its parts; rather, each part of society is functional for the stability of the whole society.” (Crossman, 2014). Essentially, functionalists believe that society is like the Star Wars’ Force, and everything that happens in society works to bring balance to the Force. The second perspective is symbolic interaction. This theory is described as “Symbolic interaction theory analyzes society by addressing the subjective meanings that people impose on objects, events, and behaviors.” (Crossman, 2015). Basically, these types of people believe that society is constructed on human interpretation. Finally, the third type of perspective is conflict theory. Crossman writes in her article, “Conflict theory states that tensions and conflicts arise when resources, status, and power are unevenly distributed between groups in society, and that these conflicts become the engine for social change.” (Crossman, 2016). They believe that when power is unbalanced, it will become controlled by those in higher classes, and dominate those in lower classes through different parts of society.

Starting off, this will show a comparison between white and black crimes, based on facts from the website for the Federal Bureau of Investigations. All statistics throughout this research paper, are from 2012, and have been collected from the Federal Bureau of Investigations, Department of Justice, and multiple news organizations. The data collected from these different agencies has been analyzed and put into it’s best format to fit what is being asked in this topic. All sources have been checked out, and found that they are not biased toward any of the races discussed in the article. Some crimes are committed by whites at a higher rate than other races, although these results that have been gathered to complete this paper could show that African

In our society there is many different types of crimes, I will be focusing specifically on street crime and white-collared crime. Each of these criminal communities has criminals that in the end are just trying to reach a goal. Whether it is the American dream of living in luxury or just trying to make ends meet. “White collared” crime is defined as a nonviolent criminal act that is motivated by financial gain. Then there is “street crime” which is defined as a criminal offense that is committed in a public place. Some examples of white-collar crimes are: embezzlement, corporate price-fixing, fraud, bribery, forgery, money laundering, cybercrime, copyright infringement, etc. While some examples of street crime are: robbing, murder, rape, sale of illegal drugs, assault, auto theft, etc.

White-collar crimes are just as prevalent today as ordinary street crimes. Studies show that criminal acts committed by white-collar criminals continue to increase due to unforeseen opportunities presented in the corporate world, but these crimes are often overlooked or minimally publicized in reference to criminal acts on the street. Many street crimes are viewed as unnecessary, horrendous crimes because they are committed by lower class citizens, whereas white collar crimes are illegal acts committed by seemingly respectable people whose occupational roles are considered successful and often admired by many (Piquero, 2014). These views often allow white collar crimes to “slip through the cracks” and carry lesser charges or punishment.

White Collar crime is not a crime unto it self, but instead a criteria that has to be met in order for a crime to be considered as White- Collar Crime; (Blount, 2002) hence the reason why Corporate Crime is also considered as White- Collar Crime. At the same time, White Collar Crime and Corporate Crime can be seen as distinct criminological categories, however, in order to reveal this, this essay will firstly be exploring Sutherland's definition of white collar crime and the perplexity with this definition of white-collar crime. It will then be looking at the modification which had to take place with Sutherland's definition of white-collar crime in order to established a distinction between white-collar and corporate crime.

compared, include white collar crime and street crime. When people commit a white collar crime

Most everyone goes home after a long day of work and watches the news. Think, what is usually reported? The weather, local activities, headline news, or daily criminal activity. Shootings, stabbings, homicides, etc. are all discussed by media anchors these days. This causes most everyone in our society to become familiar with crimes that are considered street crimes. What most people don’t hear about on the news is what is considered white-collar crime, sometimes known as corporate crime. White-collar crime not only is less reported in the media but also receives weaker punishments than street crime. This paper will first discuss the similarities between the two types of crime and then explain why their punishments are strongly

Crimes are commonly broken down to and classified into one of three categories: blue collar crimes, white color crimes and green collar crimes. Blue collar crimes are basically described as crimes that are committed by a lower social class unlike white collar crimes are more likely to be committed by people from a higher social class. Examples of blue collar crimes are: Armed Robbery, Assault/Battery, Burglary, Shoplifting and Forgery. Now that doesn’t mean that people from a higher social class do not commit these types of crimes but statistically those from lower social class are more likely to do so. “Of the millions of common-property and theft related crimes that occur each year, most are committed by occasional criminals who do not define

In 1939, American sociologist Edwin Sutherland introduced the phrase “white-collar crime”. White-collar crime is a nonviolent crime committed by a business or large corporations. They are usually scams or frauds to gain wealth in society. The people who are guilty of this crime lie, cheat and steal from investors of their company or business. Even though these crimes are non-violent, they have major impacts on the society. Their companies become non existent and families get destroyed. All of their life savings and savings for their children get taken away, and they become bankrupt. Not only does it affect their families, the investors who believed in their business lose millions or even billions of dollars.

White-Collar Crime consists of occupational crime and corporate crime. Occupational crime refers to offences committed against legitimate institutions businesses or government by those with "respectable" social status. It includes the embezzlement of corporate funds, tax evasion, computer crime and expense-account fraud. It is not every day that we hear about white-collar crimes but these non-violent crimes are on the rise to the top. Federal Bureau of Investigation states that USA, for example recorded white collar crimes amounting $300 billion every year (Cornell University, 2010). White-collar crime is relatively a new idea. It has many aspects that are practical for study and further interpretation to clear some of its dark areas. White-Collar Crime was once introduced by Edwin Sutherland in 1939 during his speech in American Sociological Society. The following crimes actually performed are Bribery, Extortion, Insurance, Fraud, Embezzlement, Cybercrime etc. People who participate in these criminal activities are highly powerful and respectful among the society. The following activities include description about White-collar Crime, Investigation of White Collar Crime and The Consequences of committing a White-collar Crime.

Quinney (1964), “Because the validity of white collar crime as a form of crime has been a subject of severe controversy, the question of conceptual clarity has largely been ignored. Today, as a result, the meaning of the concept is not always clear” (p208).