Comparison Of White Collar Crimes And Corporate Crime

White collar crimes and corporate crime are two of the most difficult crimes to prevent, most of the time these crimes are caught by chance. White collar crime is defined as a violation of the law committed by a person or group of persons in the course of an otherwise respected and legitimate occupation of business enterprise (Adler, F. & Mueller, G. 2013). Crimes committed by an individual can go from: security related crimes, tax fraud, insurance fraud, consumer fraud, corruption and many more. It’s not easy to determine the frequency of these crimes because they are often well planned and executed by people with high positions in the companies. It’s also hard to define corporate crime because we often encounter the question if the corporation

The fraud triangle was developed by Dr. Donald Cressey; it was designed to explain the reasons behind the crimes. According to Dr. Cressey three factors are present when a person commits fraud: pressure, opportunity, and rationalization. When a person commits a crime there’s usually a reason behind it, and this reason can motivate him to commit such crime, for example: divorce, debt, or addictions. This is known as the pressure factor. Opportunities can also lead a person to commit fraud, for example: inadequate separation of duties, fast employee turnover, crisis conditions, or workaholic environment. The third and last factor that can lead a person to commit fraud is rationalization. People that commit crimes like this; convince themselves that even though that what they are doing is wrong it is okay. For example they may think it is okay to do so because “nobody will ever notice”, “they work a lot of hours” or “they borrow the money thinking they will pay it back”. Although white collar crimes are hard to define and determine, knowing the factors developed by Dr. Cressey can help to determine who is committing a crime in an organization. These factors in conjunction with other possible solutions may stop white collar

For example knowing the three factors, if employees are aware of this, including the people with higher positions, everybody can be in the lookout for it, they will be able to notice if an individual in the corporation is acting different, or seem suspicious. Other possible solutions can be; having a positive workplace, good policies (keeping the employees happy), be engaged (review monthly statements), or knowing your employees (dialogue with them; make them feel like they are an asset to your corporation and not just a number). I believe that “a happy employee is a successful corporation”; if employees are happy with their workplace, and with their job, they could be less likely commit a white collar