Sociology Report: Corporate and Occupational Crime Impacts on Society

This report delves into the realms of corporate and occupational crimes, examining their definitions, distinctions, and impacts on society. It begins with a summary of an article discussing a Justice Department official's resignation due to ethical concerns regarding conduct within the White House, setting the stage for a discussion on corporate and occupational crimes. The report differentiates between the two types of crime, highlighting that occupational crimes are committed by individuals for personal gain within a work setting, while corporate crimes are orchestrated by top-level management to benefit the corporation. It explores the various types of each crime, such as embezzlement, securities violations, and tax evasion. Furthermore, the report analyzes the societal impacts, including economic consequences like increased costs for consumers, unemployment, and a potential rise in overall crime rates. The report concludes by emphasizing the damage these crimes inflict on both the business sector and the broader economy.

Running head: SOCIOLOGY 1
Sociology
Name:
Institution:

SOCIOLOGY 2
1. Article Summary
Justice Official Quits over White House Conduct ‘I Would not Tolerate Seeing in a
Company’
A high ranked corporate crime expert in the United State Justice Department quit her job.
She claimed that it is not possible to hold suspected lawbreakers to standards that Trump as the
POTUS does not personally recognize. Hui Chen, who worked in the fraud unit of DOJ's
criminal department as a compliance counsel, broke the news on a post in LinkedIn, published
on 25th June. She stated that it was not easy to sit across from corporative representative and ask
for a fundamental behavioral standard which is not implemented in the white house. She claimed
that attempting to keep organization to standards which the present administration does not
support was like establishing a cognitive dissonance which she could never overcome.
Even as she engaged in evaluations and questioning, the different lawsuits pending against the
president were always in her mind. Such law suits included the constitutional contravention to
conflict of interest, the on-progress investigations of possibly treasonous behaviors and the
prosecutors and investigators were fired for their pursuit of facts and principles. She argued that
at her personal level she could not tolerate facing such conducts in a company. Yet the
administration she worked for concisely engaged in the same behaviors. She opted out since she
felt that she could no longer tolerate being part of such corporate crimes.

SOCIOLOGY 3
2. Corporate and Occupational Crimes and Their Impacts on Society
Occupational Crime
Occupational crimes include structure systems abuse in the work environment to
accomplish different white-collar crimes (Henry N. Pontell, 2010). Most of them entail access by
managers or employees looking for individual gains. It bears a lot of similarities in comparison
to organized crime and might include overlaps with elements of organized crimes. In certain
instances, occupational offenses are conducted through combined efforts of various individuals
rather than a single person. Some of the common crimes of this nature include; embezzlement,
securities and stock violation, corruption by government officials, money laundering, altering
records, tax evasions, racketeering among others.
Corporate Crime
Corporate crimes are seen as overall classifications of the white-collar crime. The crimes
are popular with reference to occupational offenses. The difference between the two is that while
corporate offense is done by top executives to benefit the company, occupational crimes are
organized by personal employees against the company or its consumers and customers in the
course of their tenure (Friedrichs, 2016). When dealing with corporate crime, the top question is
whether a corporation has the capacity to conduct one. The question can be answered by
considering circumstances through which considerable harm is caused by the operations of the
corporation.

SOCIOLOGY 4
Comparison
People or small groups commit occupational crimes in their jobs for their personal benefit
and it can involve employees at any level. On the other hand, corporate crime is conducted by
top levels managerial in benefit of the corporation. Both the organization and individuals could
be offenders in corporate crime. Only individuals are liable for criminality in occupational crime
as it is deemed an offense against the company (Salinger, 2015). Hence corporations turn into
crime victims when they suffer losses due to a crime committed by either the managers or other
staff. On the context of an offense committed for the advantage of the legal organization, the
corporates becomes a perpetrator (Marshall Clinard, 2011). In criminological perception
occupational offense is connected to a personal approach to attribute the illegal action. For
corporate crime, the action might be attributed to the failure of systems.
Impacts on Society
Generally, people who commit occupational or corporate crime tend to think the effects
of the actions will not go beyond the organization (Payne, 2012). In the real sense, such crimes
might result in devastating ripple effects. When an organization experiences from fraud from any
direction it should make up for it through raising costs, which eventually translates into
expensive commodities for consumers. The impact continues to worsen when it comes to a time
that the employees and the investors are no longer able to repay loans and it becomes hard to
obtain credibility (Friedrichs, 2016). The effects are extended to society in different manners. For
instance, collapsing of big corporations might lead to a high rate of unemployment in the
respective communities. Life becomes hard as people scramble for the small number of jobs
available. Skyrocketing of commodity prices will also affect the community in a negative

SOCIOLOGY 5
manner as they might not afford the high prices. There is a high likelihood of crime increase in
society as a result of people seeking to earn a living out of it. Corporation and occupational crime
hurt both the business sector and economy at large.

SOCIOLOGY 6
References
Friedrichs, D. O. (2016). Trusted Criminals: White Collar Crime In Contemporary Society.
Boston: Cengage Learning.
Henry N. Pontell, G. L. (2010). International Handbook of White-Collar and Corporate Crime.
Berlin: Springer Science & Business Media.
Marshall Clinard, P. Y. (2011). Corporate Crime. Piscataway: Transaction Publishers.
Payne, B. K. (2012). White-Collar Crime: The Essentials: The Essentials. Thousand Oaks:
SAGE.
Salinger, L. M. (2015). Encyclopedia of White-Collar & Corporate Crime, Volume 1. Newcastle
upon Tyne: SAGE
Article link:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/hui-chen-quits-justice_n_5959be5ce4b0da2c732455c9