Government rules force coin store to close

BTW, here is the full text of the Bill that had been proposed by the Illinois Senate:

http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ful...m=3341&GAID=11&LegID=64562&SpecSess=&Session=

 

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Good find. Strange that the source I found said the full text of the bill was never released. At least it would have allowed for selling without an original receipt:

As for the paper, yes I did read most of it and it has nothing to do with the effects of laws requiring proof of ownership or stringent administrative record keeping requirements placed upon bullion dealers. It merely documents a tenuous relationship between the number of pawn shops and the number of burglaries, larcenies, and robberies. It does not prove which leads to which. Pawn shops could very well be the responsive element in that high property crime areas tend to have more pawn shops, not that more pawn shops cause more crime. Also, did you notice what kind of relationship the author found between pawn shops and propery crimes? Here ya go:

Despite the fact that the paper does not "prove" pawn shops increase crime, the author keeps saying things like "pawnshops raises the rate of robberies...". In order to prove which causes which, a time based study of pawn shops and crime rates would be required. Looking at the author's CV, he is smart enough to know this, which leads me to believe he was either lazy, or his paper was intentionally biased.

 

Essentially, it's a chicken:egg argument, but the staggering aspect is the 10%:1% ratio.

If we look at actual numbers, assuming a community has two pawn shops, increasing that number to eight would see a 600% increase in the number of shops or a 60% increase in the crime rate. Add another 12 shops, and you'd have a 15% increase in the crime rate, for a total increase of 90%. So, basically, for every pawnshop open, it would take 10 additional shops to offset the liquidation of a 100% increase in the crime rate. I assume this has to do with liquidity. More shops = more chances to fence items. After all, I assume most shops would sooner turn away someone who couldn't comply with the law than call the police on them.

All of this said, I have a funny story about all of this. I went with my friend to a cookie store, and I noticed a jewelry shop selling jade next door. I went in with my friend, and while there, the salesperson who helped us told a guy trying to sell a gold bracelet that she couldn't buy it without ID. He said "the other guy bought from me before." So she tells the owner to deal with the guy, and the owner bought the stuff without question. It really made me wonder if it was simply a liability issue. The seller looked messy, and was twitching a lot. I thought it was funny when we got back to the car and my friend says "Wow, now I know where to tell the crackheads at the hospital to fence their goods."

 

That's the most logical connection that I can think of too. Criminals don't want to go to the same pawn shop too often unless they know the owner is willing to knowingly buy stolen goods. This might even be more strongly influenced by city size rather than the number of pawn shops per 100,000 people in any particular county, but I don't remember if the author proved his findings weren't influenced by city size, only that he studied "urban counties".

When I read your example of a community going from 2 pawn shops to 10 and then 22, my first thought was "that isn't very realistic". But once I got past that, I tried to imagine a town of 20,000 with 22 pawn shops. Just the sight of 22 pawn shops in a small town would be enough to increase the crime rate through clinical depression alone. :too-funny:

 

Related: my brother has his own business. He could make a lot more money if he hired few employees. He won't do it though because of the significant government nightmare involved in doing so. And you wonder why unemployment is so high?

 

try the whole article...he basically is saying he would rather let people sell stolen goods all day long ....what a loser

 

It doesn't seem to stop thousands of other small businesses. If your brother has so much trouble keeping up with paperwork that he can't deal with employees, he's probably making a wise choice.

I'm sure that some of the paperwork burden is gratuitous, excessive and pointless. I'm also sure that any attempt to significantly reduce the paperwork would cut out useful regulations as well, and lead to unpleasant unintended consequences. "Common-sense reform" is doomed from the beginning, given that "sense" is so un-"common" in the legislative environment.

 

My friend is a plumber with his own business. He has several employees. He takes every Thursday for bookkeeping of various sorts- that is one fifth of his money making time.

 

It seems as though some think that paperwork in business is only related to taxes and government regulation. I've been in management for a number of years, and with few exceptions, most businesses paperwork is involved in organization, preparation, and personal record keeping. Yes gov't regulations are a pain in the rear end, but are a fact of life. Getting yourself in a good routine is the key. When you don't do that, it's easy to blame someone (or something) else. It's even harder to do when you're hiding something!

 

Estimates and bids

 

Yeah I suppose those are biggies, too. A different kind of paperwork, but still paperwork.