Poll: Do you think stealing from the poor is worst than stealing from the rich?

[Lufia Erim]

I was taking a look at my bank statement and i was thinking what would i do if someone hacked my bank account. I then consoled myself thinking that i have so little money that no one would bother to take it. As of speaking i have little over 400$ in my bank. I also thought it would be quite the dick move if someone stole money from me because i have so little. Thus implying ( to myself) that if someone stole from a rich guy it wouldn't be as bad.

Now , stealing is bad ,no two ways about it, but i think it's worst steal from a poor guy than a rich guy. Of course being poor i am biased.

So escapists do you think it's worst to steal from the poor than the rich? Is it just as bad? Is it better? What do you think?

Key word here is worst

 

[Eclipse Dragon]

If you want to look at it in terms of the crime, "aka stealing is stealing no matter who from" then they're equally bad, however...


IMO It's worse to steal from the poor because if you steal from the rich, they become less rich, but have more cushion to absorb the blow. If you steal from the poor, depending on exactly how poor they are, you have a very likely chance of ruining their entire life.

I am probably also biased.

 

[TakerFoxx]

If you hack an account at random and it so happened to be someone who is poor, then I'd say it's as morally bad as if you had ended up with a rich account, but still does more damage, and your carelessness with such things really doesn't reflect well on you. But then, you're already hacking people's accounts and stealing their money, so that ship has sailed.

But if you deliberately target a poor man's account over a rich one, then yeah, that is far worse.

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

The ability of someone to bounce back from theft is dependent on how their assets are controlled. The wealthy diversify their wealth and could probably stay at a higher level of society after a blow to their finances. They may never reclaim their old position politically or financially but they'll certainly survive. Worst case scenario? They have to sell their toys (Ferrari's, boats, cabins, etc) and maybe live a more modest lifestyle.

The poorest of the poor usually have everything they own either on them or stored in one location because they can't afford to have what little they have far away from them. So if someone steals from them, they're likely to lose practically everything they need and it could mean they may not be able to feed and warm themselves.

So while I can't condone theft in any circumstance, I feel significantly worse when I hear it happened to someone in a very vulnerable position.

 

[Casual Shinji]

If we're talking purely money than, yeah, kinda.

In the eyes of the law theft is theft naturally, but stealing a hundred bucks from a family that makes minimum wage and has extreme trouble paying the rent and taxes every month as opposed to stealing it from a family that makes 100.000 dollars a month, than I'm obviously going to feel worse for the former.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Both options are equally illegal.
Morally, it's more reproachable to steal from someone who needs the money vs. someone who doesn't.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Well, stealing from the poor will affect them more, so I'd say that that is worse. It still isn't right to steal from the rich, but if you steal $1,000 from someone who makes that much in a day, it probably won't affect them much. However, if you steal that much from someone who only makes that much every few weeks, then you may be also be taking basic necessities from them, not just making them wait a bit longer for their next luxury item.

 

[Euryalus]

It's worse to steal from the poor because it makes you a stupid thief... Wait, what other metric were we using here?

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Stealing is stealing. But if you are going to take the basics of current legal codices in most Western nations, most people who are rich have insurance, of which the premiums are set to the number of thefts that the insurance firm had to compensate for. 'Course if everybody stole from the rich then insurance would be unaffordable but to an ever dwindling minority who can pay outrageous fees for its economic protection.

Though the argument can be made that the rich grow richer at the expense of the poor, and there's good enough clause to believe this given it's also the rich who can afford to give and don't and nobody in a capitalist system ever receives the full benefits of their production. Though what else is new? Humanity has never achieved a state whereby everybody gets their just reward, but rather more or less than what they are truly owed.

You don't get rich by being charitable, but rather embracing self interest (whether you consider right or wrong is an entirely other concept).

I would say in a purely mechanical sense that I have little qualms with a multi-billionaire losing a few thousand out of their bank account compared to a poor person losing a dollar, given as we operate now, the poor are enslaved by inflation of general wealth of which only benefits disproportionately a few people compared to the many who have to pay more, and have less to give. The inevitability being an economic collapse and readjustment, and it's never the rich that suffer from this as much as the poor.

It's worse to steal from the poor because it makes you a stupid thief... Wait, what other metric were we using here?

Poor people have less security systems in their homes?

 

[madwarper]

Key word here is worst

No, the keyword is 'worsE'. As in "better or worsE", as opposed to "best or worst".

And, it depends on what you're stealing... If you're stealing a loaf of bread, then it doesn't really matter who you steal it from. Sure, the "rich" might have a better quality bread, but at the end of the day you don't starve.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Both are still the same crime but yeah, it is worst to steal from the poor than it is from the rich. We assume that the poor person is already stuggle to earn just as much and the rich person can easily replaced the lost money.

Still this could be a grey area per say if you don't know the whole extent of the person you're stealing it from like e.g. the poor person you stole got a whole lots of money from price/ will etc or a rich person you stole was going to donate his/ her whole money toward something. Ok well both are unrealistic scenario.

 

[Euryalus]

It's worse to steal from the poor because it makes you a stupid thief... Wait, what other metric were we using here?

Poor people have less security systems in their homes?

The question seemed to imply success or probable success. *shrugs*

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

It's worse to steal from the poor because it makes you a stupid thief... Wait, what other metric were we using here?

Poor people have less security systems in their homes?

The question seemed to imply success or probable success. *shrugs*

Maybe more risk vs. reward, I'm thinking.

If you're almost guaranteed to be able to steal a 100 bucks, but a thousand times more likely to get caught stealing $1'000'000, sort of thing. Most people will go with the 100, even though a thousand times the risk ends up with 10'000 times the result.

Though arguably you could say it's more or less the same, yeah.

 

[DementedSheep]

They're both wrong but if you're stealing from the poor you're probably doing more damage to them so it is worse. Even if you steal a lot more for the rich person than the poor person the rich person will most likely have good insurance and other safety nets.

 

[Euryalus]

It's worse to steal from the poor because it makes you a stupid thief... Wait, what other metric were we using here?

Poor people have less security systems in their homes?

The question seemed to imply success or probable success. *shrugs*

Maybe more risk vs. reward, I'm thinking.

If you're almost guaranteed to be able to steal a 100 bucks, but a thousand times more likely to get caught stealing $1'000'000, sort of thing.

Though arguably you could say it's more or less the same, yeah.

If it makes you feel any better, it was a throw away quip and not my actual moral views. You're probably right.

You put more thought into it than I have... which is to say any at all

 

[L. Declis]

Equal.

I know it's unpopular, but I dislike this recent "All rich people are evil and if something bad happens to them, they shall be fine" narrative.

They got the money fair and square (generally), and just because they are worth more to society and so get more money doesn't mean they don't also deserve that money.

 

[FalloutJack]

Much worse to steal from the poor. The poor didn't steal half of what they've got, unless it was due to starvation. Even then, the only people THAT screwed over are those who have overage.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

Most of the time it's worse to steal from the poor because they have so little and they can't afford to lose any of it. The rich can usually make do if they lose a bit of money/stuff.

Unless, of course, you steal so MUCH from the rich person that they become poor. Then it's hugely crushing and life-shattering and they're probably not going to recover.

It depends on how much worse off the victim of the theft will be afterwards. Typically, this means that the poor are most affected, therefore it's worse to steal from the poor.

Make no mistake, though, it's a shitty thing to do no matter how the victim in. Unless the victim is a thief who stoel that money in the first place, at which point it's poetic justice. XD

Also, WTF, this captcha is sliding back and forth. I think it wants to hypnotize me!