Car theft is a man’s world, according to a new paper by Christopher W. Mullins and Michael G. Cherbonneau. Car thieves face two big tasks: stealing the car and selling it. Both male and female thieves are “mentored” by more experienced thieves?in much the same way; however, men have an advantage when it’s time to sell the stolen goods. “They are more connected to a social network of criminals that provides access to chop shops, where the cars can be dismantled and sold for parts,” reports Tom Bartlett. Mullins and Cherbonneau conclude that “[w]ithout these contacts the ability to profit from auto theft was significantly curtailed. The next profitable source for those who lack access to these higher outlets was to sell vehicle parts and accessories on the streets. … Yet, even those who sold parts on the street relied upon social networks to either move parts or become aware of customers.” [%comments]
Why Car Thieves Are Male
TAGS: crime, gender relations
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So females are less social?
Why do I find this to be so incomplete? If we’re going for ‘Why?’, let’s ask why males are more socially connected…
Is the implication here that women need to hone their crime circle social networking skills? The future of social media is apparently female (http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2008/tc20080516_580743.htm) and women tend to have higher returns on social capital exchanges (http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/ronald.burt/research/GSC.pdf) so why shouldn’t they be able to dominate the car theft market, if social networking is all it takes?
There must be another force at work, and the premise of this article must be a gross over-simplification of complex criminal processes that go far beyond gender roles.
Is it not true that in general that most criminals are male? Prisons are overwhelmingly male, so this would seem to imply such.
Are a higher percentage of car thieves compared to criminals as a whole?
The article didn’t say that men were more skilled, just more connected.
Maybe we should reduce the punishments for females involved in auto theft, and maybe even for chop shops working with female car thieves. This might make opportunities in the field more equal.
Yes, the premise sounds, on the face of it, all wrong. To me, more males steal cars than females for much the same reason that more males buy Car & Driver magazine than women.
Along the same vein, I’d be curious to know who shoplifts clothing more: men or women?
I don’t interpret the article as insinuating that women are less capable at building social capital than men. Rather, I think the authors argue that profiting from auto theft requires access to a very specific social network that has been traditionally male-dominated, and tends to remain male-dominated because of the mentoring needed to get into the “field”, as well as the “invitation-only” nature of it.
What a lame excuse for analysis.
I suppose the reason men commit most murders is that they have a social network to weapons?
If you’re going to do an over-simplistic gender role correlation, at least it should make sense: people steal what they are familiar with and what they covet. That might be why more men steal cars and more women, like Rudy Guiliani’s daughter, [allegedly] steal makeup.