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The Freakonomics of Bike Theft
I dont understand why bicycles are stolen so much more frequently than other things available in a city like cars and store merchandise? From what I have read online, bike thiefs have all sorts of elaborate tools to cut through any lock system. So why dont they use this knowledge to steal cars or break store windows and steal merchandise?
Who actually buys these stolen bikes? My guess is they get pennies on the dollar for the bikes they steal. Anyone buying a $300+ bike is pretty savvy and can smell a stolen bike a mile away. So the people buying them must be totally ignorant and pay less than $50 for them, which is the same price as a brand new bike in Walmart.
So what am I missing about the 'freakonomics' of bike theft?
Because nobody cares if a bike is stolen. Only the bikers themselves. The police don't care. People on the street don't care.
And you will get prosecuted if you catch someone stealing your bike and get in a fight about it.
But alot of bikes are stolen buy junkies, then sold to a ebayer, or craigslister, then sold to you. Or taken apart and sold to you.
Faulty premise. Cars are definitely stolen in cities, and in great numbers. Theft of merchandise, shoplifting, burglary, and even armed robbery, is way too common.
I'd say that far more value is stolen from stores than in bicycles. But that's just my guess.
First off there is a lot of paranoia about bike theft. The thief stalking bikes with power tools is pretty rare. Most thefts are from improperly locked bikes, unlocked bikes, or bikes with cheap locks (cable or cheap Ulock).
That aside, just about everyone knows how to ride a bike, so the market is huge. Bikes are also hard to identify at a glance, and easy to transport and hide, if need be. Bikes aren't stolen more often than goods in stores.
Think about it this way... for every 3 people we know, 1 or 2 of them have had a bike stolen from them at some point in their lives.
Most of us don't know any store owners on a personal level, but let's pretend that we do. For every 3 store owners we know, 3 of them have had goods shoplifted from their store, not only at some point in the past, but probably within the last few months.
Why do people steal bikes... probably because of the low security. YOU are the only one on patrol. Bystanders couldn't do anything even if they wanted to. On the otherhand, stores have an entire "loss prevention" team on duty all day, every day.
When I worked in the stockroom of,um....a store(doesn't matter which one),at one points our shrink rate(how much was getting stolen) was 22%. That means 22% of our merchandise was walking out the door. I'm sure the bike theft rate in the DC area is no where near 22%.
2 reasons bike theft is a problem:improperly secured,hard to ID. I've seen lots of bikes locked up in ways that ranged from improper to just plain stupid,or that weren't even locked at all. Plus bikes usually don't have the paper trail cars do. Cars have serial #'s in several places,plus license plates,parking decals,road tax discs,etc. And you have an owner's card,insurance card,paperwork for the loan;all kinds of paper that ID the vehicle and prove it's yours.