white-collar crime

(noun)

A non-violent crime, generally for personal gain and often involving money.

Related Terms

Examples of white-collar crime in the following topics:

  • White-Collar Crime

    • White-collar crime is a financially motivated, nonviolent crime committed for illegal monetary gain.
    • White-collar crime is a financially motivated, nonviolent crime committed for illegal monetary gain.
    • White-collar crime, is similar to corporate crime, because white-collar employees are more likely to commit fraud, bribery, ponzi schemes, insider trading, embezzlement, cyber crime, copyright infringement, money laundering, identity theft, and forgery .
    • The relationship that white-collar crime has with corporate crime is that they are similar because they both are involved within the business world.
    • Their difference is that white-collar crime benefits the individual involved, and corporate crime benefits the company or the corporation.

  • Class, Crime, and the Criminal Justice System

    • For instance someone committing a white collar crime is most likely from the higher classes and is less likely to be reported or punish.
    • White-collar crime is a financially motivated, nonviolent crime committed for illegal monetary gain.
    • Indeed, white-collar crimes are typically committed by individuals in higher social classes.
    • Additionally, men benefit more from white-collar crime than do women, as they are more likely to attempt these crimes when they are in more powerful positions, allowing them to reap greater rewards.
    • Explain why white-collar crime is less likely to be tracked in the U.S.

  • Theories of Deviance

    • The criminal justice system is also structured to reflect differences in power and property, as white collar crime illustrates.
    • White-collar crimes are typically committed by individuals in higher social classes.
    • Examples of white-collar crimes include:
    • As of 2009, the FBI and the Bureau of Justice Statistics do not provide clear statistics on white-collar crime, like they do with other types of crime.
    • Most of the statistics provided are estimates of losses resulting from white-collar crime, which include:

  • Differential Association Theory

    • This does not deny that there may be practical motives for crime.
    • When criminal behavior is learned, the learning includes techniques of committing the crime (which are sometimes very complicated, sometimes simple) and the specific direction of motives, drives, rationalizations, and attitudes.
    • One very unique aspect of this theory is that it works to explain more than just juvenile delinquency and crime committed by lower class individuals.
    • Since crime is understood to be learned behavior, the theory is also applicable to white-collar, corporate, and organized crime.

  • Class

    • Middle class workers are sometimes called white-collar workers.
    • Members of the working class are sometimes called blue-collar workers.
    • In the United States, neighborhoods are stratified by class such that the lower class is often made to live in crime-ridden, decaying areas.

  • Inequalities of Work

    • This explanation of the pay gap invokes the notion of the pink-collar worker.
    • A "pink-collar worker" is a term for designating the types of jobs in the service industry that are considered to be stereotypically female, such as working as a waitress, nurse, teacher, or secretary.
    • The term attempts to distinguish this type of work from blue-collar and white-collar work.

  • Job Discrimination

    • This explanation of the pay gap invokes the notion of the pink-collar worker.
    • A pink-collar worker is a term for designating the types of jobs in the service industry that are considered to be stereotypically female, such as working as a waitress, nurse, teacher or secretary.
    • The term attempts to distinguish this type of work from blue-collar and white-collar work.

  • Crime Statistics

    • It is important to understand that crime statistics do not provide a perfect view of crime.
    • Government statistics on crime only show data for crimes that have been reported to authorities.
    • These crimes represent only a fraction of those crimes that have been acted upon by law enforcement, which in turn represents only a fraction of those crimes where people have made complaints to the police, which in turn represents only a fraction of the total crimes committed.
    • African Americans are no more likely to use drugs than are whites, but between 1980 and 2003, the arrest rates for African Americans for drug offenses has risen at three times the rate as it has for whites, 225% vs. 70%.The reason: drug use and trafficking in the inner-city as opposed to suburbs has been the focus of the war.Additionally, penalties for using drugs that are more often found among minorities have traditionally been harsher than for drugs used by whites.
    • This suggests that the criminal justice system in the US values white victims above minority victims.

  • The Working Class

    • Those in the working class are commonly employed in low-skilled occupations, including clerical and retail positions and blue collar or manual labor occupations.
    • Low-level, white-collar employees are sometimes included in this class, such as secretaries and call center employees.

  • Introduction to deviance

    • The first, crime is the violation of formally enacted laws and is referred to as formal deviance.
    • For instance, heterosexual white males may become drag queens on the weekend.
    • It is a vacation because heterosexual white males can afford to descend temporarily and then return to the advantages of their true socioeconomic status.
    • Other examples include white hip-hop acts like Eminem and Nu-Metal bands like Limp Bizkit that mimic lower or middle class people in order to use their socioeconomic credentials for profit, despite their true socioeconomic status.
    • This chapter will cover the theories of deviance used by sociologists and will also cover current crime statistics.