How to commit the perfect crime

[Blue_Tires]

Note: Dan Ariely’s new book, “The Upside of Irrationality,” was released this week. See the video below for more from Dan about the book.

There is a certain perverse pleasure in contemplating the perfect crime.

You can apply your ingenuity to the hypothetical issues of choosing a target, evading surveillance and law enforcement, dealing with contingencies and covering your tracks afterward. You can prove to yourself what an accomplished criminal mastermind you would be, if you so chose.

The perfect crime usually takes the form of a bank robbery in which the criminals cleverly bypass all security systems using neat gadgets, rappelling wires and knowledge they’ve acquired over several weeks of casing the joint. This seems to be an ideal crime because we can applaud the criminals’ cunning, intelligence and resourcefulness.

But it’s not quite perfect. After all, contingencies by definition depend on chance, and therefore can’t ever be perfectly thought out (and in all good bank-robber movies, the thieves either almost get caught or do). Even if the chances of being caught are close to zero, do we really want to call this a perfect crime? The authorities are likely to take it very seriously, and respond accordingly with harsh punishment. In this light, the 0.001 percent chance of getting caught might not seem like a lot, but if you take into account the severity of punishment, such crimes suddenly seem much less perfect.

In my mind, the perfect crime is one that not only yields more money, but is one where, if by some small chance you did get caught, no one would care, and the punishment would be negligible.

So, with this new knowledge how would you go about it?

First, the crime would need to be obscure and confusing, making it difficult to detect. Breaking a window and stealing jewelry is too straightforward.

Second, the crime should involve many people engaging in the same type of crime so that no one can make an example of you à la Martha Stewart. This is why looting, though easy to detect, is much more difficult to get a handle on than a single robbery.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/voices/how-to-commit-the-perfect-crime/1269/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=fanpage&utm_campaign=pbs

[thereismore]

1. The guys who stole $9 billion from Iraq committed the perfect crime. nt

[Blue_Tires]

5. +1

most people stopped asking about it years ago...

[meegbear]

2. I thought getting away with murder is the "perfect crime"?

Money does not necessarily play into it.

[jdlh8894]

3. Become a politician?

You get to spend millions of other people's money to be elected to less than $500,000/yr position. Then while you are in that position,your portfolio multiplies.That is the perfect crime!

[damntexdem]

4. No, it's very simple: have a lot of money, and steal a lot of money.

Even if one is caught, one will likely get away with it.

Even better, become president, VP, or a high official in a GOP administration -- then one can quite literally get away with murder, of thousands.