Hacker News Reader

Crime will always pay better than legitimate alternatives. You can either choose to sacrifice the extra income or risk going to prison– that's kind of just how society functions.

> For some high proportion of these individuals, it is obvious (and indeed seems like the only choice).

Then they can go back to prison. Society need not be blackmailed into giving ex-cons excessively lucrative jobs in hopes of luring them away from crime.

View on HN

Having spent 10 years locked up with criminals I cannot think of a single one who made more money than if they had taken a legit job. Especially bad if you factor in the years behind bars.

I remember one 19-year-old kid crying in the bullpens one day. They'd just offered him 34 years. His cousin persuaded him to come rob a 7-11 with him. When they get there cousin hands him an AK47 and says "point this at the cashier while I grab the money". Kid had never touched a gun before. Accidentally pulls the trigger and fires a shot past the cashier's head into the wall. I asked him how much him and his cousin got. $1800.

Certainly. But it's not quite as binary as you make it out to be. Lowering the threshold to having a stable job for the people might change the proportion quite a bit. If we gave them excessively lucrative jobs as you suggested, we may be able to prevent most recidivism!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com