[turp182]

It's my opinion that crime in general will increase as the price of oil/gas goes up. It's simply based on the fact that people living near the edge financially when gas was cheap will see their finances failing in today's gasoline situation. There are a lot of people who work near this edge, they are the service providers of our society.

And so today I saw this article on CNN:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/06/12/crime.rate/index.html

What do you think. People speak of canaries and such, I think this bird is having breathing problems. And it will only get worse over time as those near the edge deplete their available resources and slip over the edge.

[NeoPeasant]

The capacity of the consumer to absorb increased energy costs has been vastly overestimated. They began drifting towards insolvency at lower prices, and now they are accelerating. People will become desperate, and start doing desperate things.

[the_sword]

Just more mex'skins moving to the midwest. bye bye peaceful living... hello gangs, drugs and violence. Do we still have to kneel down to the diversity crowd?

[lutherquick]

Yup, very related to PO...

The biggest crime related to PO started in March of 2003.
Where so many americans wanted to string up Saddam for 9/11 (while thinking about oil)...

The Iraq war was the starter in all this...

Looks like Bush was WRONG, not just about wmd, or peace in Iraq, but Bush said we must fight them over there, so we will not need to fight them at home...

Well, it looks like the fight is coming home, between us OIL fat cats...

[eric_b]

Yeah I saw that article and I agree with y'all.

Definitely breathing problems. If energy costs continue on their
upward course I can only imagine things will get worse.

Desperate people do desperate things.

Heh, there was some bit in the local news recently about a man
that tried to kill himself by throwing himself in the river - he was
stressed trying to afford gas for his truck or something like that.

{see if I can find link }

[MattSavinar]

I had a $1,000 worth of peak oil books and dvds stolen. I had them boxed up on my porch and waiting for the postman but somebody took him before he got there. These were heavy boxes too (50-75 pounds) so it's not like somebody can just grab them and run.

Also has a solar powered radio stolen from out there.

Best,

Matt

[Marklar]

Please!!!!

The world's coming to an end. People are in the streets acting live savages fighting for food killing each other over water.

Or maybe not.

[OVerLoRDI]

I can definitely see crime going up with gas prices. Hell I walk through my high school parking lot everyday and think of all the gas that is just sitting there.

I could see myself siphoning gas when it hits 5 dollars a gallon.

[Sys1]

It's very too soon to deduct anything about that. It could simply be statistical noise. Anyway, i would not be surprised to see crimes going up in pair with oil. That would be plainly logical.
And it would be also logical to see politics shifting toward Hitler/Staline while everything about our civilization slowly falling apart.

Something else : i'm living in Paris, where the temperature became very hot in the last week. It makes me very nervous, so i guess there are some chances that crime goes up with temperature too...
Cut air conditionner in offices and homes in Las Vegas style cities and citizens will become MAD.

[pea-jay]

Aside from obvious gas related drive off thefts and other direct fuel crimes, very little of the uptick in crime can be attributed to energy available (still good at the moment) and price (increasing but tolerable to most).

The best analysis pegged crime factors as:

Percentage of young males (15-29)
Poverty/income levels.

Those two are big determinants.

Then we add the effects of the 90s get tough approach to crime. Apparently a number of those earliest offenders are reaching the end of their longer sentances and are begining to get released back only to re-offend. This release trend will only pick up as more reach parolee status and some states start reducing prison populations to save money.

Energy is still a very small player. Wont count it out in the future, though

[untothislast]

A survey carried out in the UK last week (by motoring insurers 'esure') found that UK drivers would be prepared to pay £1.83 PER LITRE for petrol/gas (that's $3.37 USD), rather than even think about using alternative public transport. Some even said they'd never give up using their cars whatever the price rose to in future.

In view of this degree of self-flagellation, it's hard to see why the US citizenry should be turning to crime in view of its own relatively low gas prices. Are there other societal pressures at work?

[seven]

Although the price of gas is still tolerable for most citizens, it seems to be a real hardship for some of the poorest among us. I was in a local shop that buys, trades and sells used DVD's, games and CD's, and a clerk told me that more people have been selling their stuff in the last year or so, and that a substantial number of sellers now mention the price of gas as the reason they are selling. The clerk also said that, according to a friend who works in a pawnshop, lots of people are now pawning their stuff to buy gas.

[pea-jay]

Even among the poor, there still is a fair amount of items that could be exchanged for cash for gas, but now, its still too soon to affix crime to fuel prices

[Revi]

It's in the air. The poor are stressed much more than thay have ever been. It's scary. The worst is that the average person has no idea of what to do about it. I have had to call the cops twice in the past week. All of my properties were either broken into and vandalized over the last year. The natives are getting restless. I don't like it at all. I think it's related to peak oil. The price of everything is going up every year, and our paychecks aren't keeping pace.

[Revi]

It's in the air. The poor are stressed much more than thay have ever been. It's scary. The worst is that the average person has no idea of what to do about it. I have had to call the cops twice in the past week. All of my properties were either broken into and vandalized over the last year. The natives are getting restless. I don't like it at all. I think it's related to peak oil. The price of everything is going up every year, and our paychecks aren't keeping pace.

[Cynus]

I don't know what everyone is so stressed out about. Through means I won't get into, I recently came into about $1000 worth of useless books and DVDs--they were all called "The Age of Oil is Over" or some crap like that. Anyway, I was able to pawn them off and now I have gas money to last me another year or so. Hee haw!

(Just kidding Matt. Sorry you were robbed )