Rational Choice Theory: What´s White Collar Crime?

White-collar crime is crime that typically goes by unnoticed, and receives little attention. This is because these acts of crime are nonviolent. White-collar crime is financially motivated and includes insider trading, embezzlement, fraud, tax evasion, and price fixing.

Robert Merton (1968) once wrote that, “In the American Dream there is no final stopping point. The measure of ‘monetary success’ is conveniently indefinite and relative. At each income level . . . Americans want just about twenty-five percent more . . .” (found in Simpson et al., 2013). This quote explains the American ideology that money is the motive. Material success comes above all else, and American people will do what ever it takes to attain it. Merton’s anomie theory

When an individual is contemplating committing a crime, they will carefully weigh the benefits and consequences associated with that offense. Such benefits may include monetary gain, respect, and control. However, if the probability of being detected, and subsequently incarcerated is too high, it will deter them from becoming an offender. Punishments must be swift, certain, and severe enough to prevent the individual from rationalizing that committing a crime in hopes of attaining perceived benefits is the better choice. Rational choice theory is relevant in explaining white-collar crime, and the Enron scandal because the individuals are fully aware and in control of their actions. They actively and knowingly engage in illegal activates in order to reap the benefits, which in this case would be monetary gain. White-collar crime usually goes unnoticed due to its nonviolent nature. This makes it easier for these criminals to rationalize that the likelihood of them being caught and punished is exceptionally low. Due to their high status they may view any potential punishments as insignificant in comparison to the benefits they would receive. The Enron scandal was an elaborate scam that was not done in a spur of the moment way. It included mass deception hosted by highly skilled, and very wealthy men. They created a way to earn extra money that definitely

Institutional anomie and the concept of the American Dream state that Americans continually want more. They want more material success, regardless of how much they already have. To attain their desired gains, white-collar offenders will do what ever it takes to achieve it even if it requires utilizing illegal means. Prior to committing such offenses for their own personal gain, they had to weigh the benefit and consequences of their actions. Taking into consideration their status and wealth, they were able to rationalize that they would be able to go undetected and therefore sought out to seek monetary success. Had the employees at Enron not been so intensely driven towards material wealth and had they not allowed the desire to drive them away from others and from conventional values, perhaps they could have been able to appropriately rationalize and realize that there are substantial consequences that will undoubtedly outweigh the perceived benefits. This alternative could have saved thousands of victims from one of the worst white-collar crime scandals in