The data is one thing, but what about factoring in a prevailing feeling that nothing will be done about crimes like smash and grab? Why report if you have no confidence that it'll even be taken seriously. Further, I've read more than a few stories of people trying to report something only to be actively discouraged by the officer they're talking to.
I think this is a great point. As I understand the situation the police won’t bother with sub 1000 crime so I think they are way less likely to get a call or statistics for these sorts of crime. Maybe if we turn what’s left of the war on drugs into a mental health project then we can eliminate some of this. Doesn’t seem like there are any easy answers though.
One problem is that a stolen iPhone is a >$1000 crime, in fact it passes the $950 threshold to be a felony in California[1]. Police don't have the resources to deal with every stolen phone.
When iPhones were new, my cousin was a police officer in a high school. Every time a kid stole an iPhone it was a felony on their juvenile record, and no one wanted that.
It's not that the police won't bother.. the voters voted to decriminalize it essentially.
Before I left California, I had this argument with many of my liberal friends who did not believe me that their proposition would lead to this despite it stating it quite clearly in the text.
While arguing I was accused of being a right wing conspiracy theorist and spreading fox propaganda.
Now the chickens are home and Californians have no one to blame but themselves.
If the smash and grab involves anything of value the only way to get insurance to cover the loss is with a police report. So there is a (perverse?) incentive to make sure the report is filed even if nothing is done by law enforcement. For that reason I would expect that data to be somewhat accurate.
There are a lot of people for whom this isn't the case:
- car owners/homeowners whose deductible is higher than the amount stolen, or who worry about higher future insurance rates by making a claim that is mostly eaten by the deductible
- folks who don't have insurance, like students whose laptops are stolen in cafes
- international visitors
- other tourists who don't realize they need a police report to get insurance coverage, or who don't have insurance
- stores like Walgreens who presumably self-insure against theft. I am not an expert, but I would assume most retail self-insures against theft (i.e. does not carry insurance for petty theft). Interested to know if folks think that isn't the case.
I think the data is totally inaccurate. In other places I have lived, I would make a policy report about any crime, expecting the report to generate some good. I wouldn't bother in SF, unless, as you mention, I really expected to file an insurance claim.
Late last year I watched someone swipe an entire shelf of cosmetics/facial products from a downtown Walgreens and saunter out while the clerk yelled at her, "You must feel great about yourself!" And, no, this wasn't a homeless person or drug addict, AFAICT, just a well-groomed 20-something young woman who jumped into a car waiting for her outside.
That Walgreens employee told me that nothing happens. No police report. Nothing except, presumably, a note to corporate. Her sentiments were echoed by another employee at the time. And both explained how much worse things have gotten. They were incredibly pissed because they felt so utterly helpless.
While this was last year, it was at a Walgreens that I've been frequenting for years, and from what I gather from some of the chattier employees, things are still pretty bad, and altogether definitely much worse than before COVID. They have a security guard on duty more often now, but they also have significantly reduced hours.
I find it odd that people expect Walgreens to open up their books to prove the increased theft. In other contexts that's called blaming the victim. And why should I care if Walgreens is taking the opportunity to downsize at the same time? That's the epitome of whataboutism. But in any event, AFAICT, Walgreens and Target have been privately more transparent with some of the local politicians. Public transparency would just be a lose-lose from the perspective of these large corporations, especially in the current media environment where left wing social activists will blame them regardless ("Oh, look at how many millions they've been extracting from our community!") while the right wing will try to further make martyrs out of them--theft notwithstanding, not the kind of public persona these companies want.
Regarding insurance, I wouldn't be surprised if Walgreens and Target self-insure in situations like this. What I do know is that after a spate of burglaries along the commercial strip in my Outer Richmond neighborhood, the local business association (the president is the owner of a restaurant we frequent, and we're on some of her mailing lists) ran a funding drive to help those businesses recover. The implication seemed to be that either the businesses lacked the necessary insurance coverage altogether, or it fell short of what they needed. Which wouldn't at all be surprising to me. (Also wouldn't be surprising if not every business filed a police report. When nearly every business on both sides of the street, up-and-down three+ blocks is burgled in the span of two weeks, what would be the point? Even an insurer might not even care at that point; it'd be like asking each and every claimant to prove an earthquake or hurricane.)
Why is it perverse to file a police report so you can file insurance? Why is it perverse to file a police report, even to just make sure that crime statistics are accurate?
I was more intending to say it is unfortunate that one needs to make a police report that will likely lead to no action on the part of law enforcement to make an insurance claim. Perverse was definitely not the best word choice.
Insurance requires a deductible. It’s not worth filing claims for repeated small thefts. This is why many homeowners don’t bother reporting small package thefts - if the city leadership won’t punish (and deter) crime and if insurance deductibles are higher than the cost of the stolen item, then what’s the point?
Big corporations are likely self-insured. It wouldn't make much sense for Walgreens to purchase insurance to protect against shoplifting. It's likely just accounted for as inventory shrinkage.
I agree for personal insurance people would file a report, but that assumes the theft exceeded your deductible.
Generally, leaving something in your car is treated as akin to leaving something in a locked box outside. If you love it, don't leave it.
Other areas with a...ahem...more positive view toward cars spend a significant amount of resources to make it relatively safe to leave things in your car, but that's not San Francisco's priority, for better or worse (it's one of the weird places where the power brokers are either on a bike, in an Uber, on Muni, or being chauffeured privately).
Some years ago an associate had reported theft of 500 CDs plus some other things to his car insurance company. They were going to cover it all.
Then they had another phone call where he asked how fast he could get the money, as he needed to replace the CDs before he could return to work.
The quick witted agent said something like 'oh so these CDs that were stolen were for your work?" - He replied yes. Claim was then denied - his policy was not a commercial policy.
Currently reviewing: Toying with Django, PostgreSQL stack and re-upping my C++ knowledge
Completed an extended contract at Apple working primarily on building python APIs for a data pipeline. Other technologies used include MongoDB, PostgreSQL and GO.
Interested taking on new challenges and learning new tools as well as deepening my knowledge of those I'm already familiar with.
For all of you still perservering against the tide on old.reddit, you can turn off this new "feature." There's a new opt-out under the privacy section of the preferences page: 'let other users see my online status'
What makes you think that these platforms are actually taking action for "the left?" Is silicon valley actually a leftist paradise full of leftist megacorperations?
They are certainly aligned with the US Democratic party, but I think it's a mistake to equate the Democrats with "the left" unless you're only speaking in that total American context where "Left=Dems, Right=GOP, end of story."
Where I live, US Democratic Party policy positions would be held by unelectable right wingers. I agree that confusing some kind of left alignment with the US Democratic Party is not advisable, even in parts of the USA.
the Democratic party of the USA is center-leftish at best.
For example they don't openly support
- unions
- universal free healthcare
- strong workers' guaranteed rights (paid holidays, paid sick leave, paternity/maternity, limited working hours - e.g. max 40 hours per week -, overtime pay etc. etc.)
Except for the word "free", https://democrats.org/where-we-stand/party-platform/achievin... makes their position on universal health care clear. Exactly how the cost gets shared by society is something that's a bit more nuanced (there's no way for it to be completely free; the question is how much is funded by taxes vs other fees).
In some sense more fair, but also in some senses less kind and less efficient. Let me give an anecdotal view as someone who had a brush with it at another big state school.
University of Washington (Seattle) has a similar system in which some majors are 'capacity constrained' meaning some students would be directly admitted to the program, but the vast majority of them would only enter the major program after being accepted via application while already attending school.
Highly competitive programs included Business and Engineering, but this even spilled over into less popular STEM variants like Math. Their CS program was and is the most competitive of these. At its worst an application round would have ~2000 applications and only ~600 open slots.
During my time there, I met a handful of students that had applied every session for the last few years to no avail. The opportunity cost is enormous. It's both a waste of time and money on the part of the students to spend multiple years wasted taking intermediate courses, retaking major-application required courses and reapplying. That's why the administration is slowly converting over to deciding major on admission, too much visible grievance on the part of students.
That aside, if it's competitive enough, it turns into a second college admissions process. Students retake the core classes required for an application like they would retake the SAT or ACT. Never mind that they passed CS 142 with a 3.4, only a 4.0 will get them in so they waste a quarter perfecting the most basic java programs for content they learned a few months prior. Students also try to engineer around the competition: a common refrain was that the equivalent courses at community college were much easier, but given the same weight in the admissions process so students would go to another college to take an easier course just to have a better shot at their dream major.
The point is that the competition for these colleges will come to a head somewhere. If it's not the college application process then it will be at the school itself. It can be managed, but putting it off till later leads to a greater burden on the losers of this process. They are faced with the choice of changing majors, changing schools or persisting with the hope that maybe the fifth application will be different than the fourth.
Fostering this kind of environment was a mistake on the part of UW. Perhaps it would have been better if they restricted applications to first years and weeded them out completely from the start like they do in your area, but letting the college admissions process do it might be much more efficient on the part of both the schools and the students.
Why have two or three instructors when you could have one associate Dean! The associate Dean even comes with a PhD! Never mind that it's in "educational leadership". That's the equivalent to a real topic. And it pays better too.
The reason people want to go to Harvard and MIT is because it's competitive and exclusive.
You can take the same courses online and buy all the same books but that doesn't prove you're smart and hard working enough to get into Harvard and MIT. Almost all of the value in going to Harvard over Boston community college is in the degree which proves you made it into an exclusive and competitive group.
They essentially do, but on other campuses throughout the state. The prestige of a University of Washington degree is much higher than one from Eastern Washington University and the quality at UW is probably also higher than that of EWU and similar schools but a student is going to be better off getting out into the world getting hands on experience with a bit lesser quality education.
Given they don't have to specify the rules broken nor the posts which broke the rule, that clarification is essentially irrelevant to the way in which this policy will likely be used.
