Stolen Goods: What to Do About Everyday Thievery

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Recently, federal investigators uncovered a massive welfare scheme in Minnesota, primarily within the Somali community. Those involved in this fraud are accused of stealing more than $1 billion in taxpayer money over several years.

At about the same time, the former executive director of Black Lives Matter, Tashella Dickerson, was charged with wire fraud and money laundering. She allegedly embezzled more than $3 million from the organization she represented.

Recently, Anthony Tepedino also faced charges of stealing millions of dollars from his own company; Lester Jones was accused of embezzling nearly $4 million from the Atlanta Hawks; and Charmaine Gatlin of the Jackson Health Foundation was sentenced to six years in prison for stealing money intended for patients.

Reactions to such headlines, which seem to make the news every few days, range from outrage to disgust. From our perch on the high ground, the rest of us tell ourselves that we’d never steal.

But how accurate is that self-assessment?

Everyday Thievery

In the category of petty thieves are shoplifters, purse snatchers, and pickpockets. Unfortunately, the list doesn’t end there.

Enter any restaurant, any grocery store, any business whatsoever, and odds are you’ll see at least one employee staring slack-jawed into a cellphone.

In the article “Employee Time Theft: The Silent Killer of Productivity,” Alyssa Joyce wrote of these workers: “Employee time theft is not just a minor issue. It costs US companies a staggering 20 [percent] of every dollar earned, equating to a massive $400 billion in lost productivity annually.”

Whether it’s phones, extended breaks, fudged work hours, or dawdling on the job, the employee who cheats his employer of time and money is a thief.

In a 2023 article, Chris Westfall investigated the relationship between plagiarism and ChatGPT, which one professor called “the greatest cheating tool ever invented.” A survey at the time revealed that 53 percent of students had used this artificial intelligence device to write an essay for class.

A broader study found large percentages of students in high school and college cheating on tests or plagiarizing sources for their papers. Only 12 percent of students said they would never cheat because of moral reasons.

Maintaining padded expense accounts, evading income tax, engaging in dishonest business practices, pirating movies and music, and living off the largesse of others without the intention of repaying their generosity: All are examples of theft of one kind or another. Even deliberately showing up late for appointments constitutes petty theft, stealing valuable time from others.

Our Slippery Standards

After a century-old philosophy of pick-and-choose relativism, it’s likely that these petty thieves—the plagiarists, the pilferers of time on the job, and all the rest—are oblivious to any sense of wrongdoing. That meager 12 percent crew of students who refused to cheat for reasons of morality represents a sort of last bastion of classical ethical strictures and personal honor.

Changes in the interpretation of the U.S. Military Academy’s Cadet Honor Code over the past few decades provide an excellent example of this retreat from traditional morality. This simple code—“A cadet does not lie, cheat, or steal, or tolerate those who do”—was once rigidly enforced. Cadets found guilty of violating it would be whisked from the barracks, placed in separate quarters, and discharged within a couple days.

As West Point graduate Tony Lentini wrote in his 2024 article “West Point Needs a Reset,” the code remains in place, but it’s now considered “aspirational,” a goal rather than a harsh reality. Authorities brushed past a recent cheating scandal involving the school’s football players, who were allowed not only to keep playing, but also to graduate. In another instance cited by Lentini, an athlete who swiped a watch from the Post Exchange was also permitted to graduate. In both cases, the old code would have sent these cadets on a bus ride home.

The Hidden Costs of Relativism

Exchanging the standards of the old faith-based morality with those of our own design comes with a cost.

Given the statistics, there are doctors practicing medicine today who cheated their way into and through medical school, a fact that should strike fear into patients. Employers who pay low, under-the-table wages to illegal immigrants are stealing from their employees and from honest competitors. Debtors who default on their credit cards are stealing from others holding that card. Gossips who spread malicious rumors are stealing the reputations of others.

Moreover, those who steal, even in small ways, are damaging themselves. Too blind to see their theft, they often pride themselves on their code of conduct, even as they undermine their honor. Even worse, when they do get away with their theft, whether it’s embezzling money from a business or using AI to write a history essay, their success encourages them to repeat the act rather than repent of it. The rot has taken hold of them.

So how do we avoid becoming thieves?

The Hard Way Is Sometimes the Best Way

We can try the aspirational approach to theft or debate whether stealing is permissible: “Everyone else is cheating in class. Why shouldn’t I?” But there’s one surefire way to avoid becoming a thief.

Set during the Great Depression, the film “Cinderella Man” includes a scene in which Jim Braddock, a heavyweight boxer down on his luck, arrives home to learn that his adolescent son, Jay, has stolen a salami from the butcher. He marches the boy off to the butcher’s, where Jay returns the loaf of salami. Immediately afterward, Braddock discovers that Jay took it because he’s terrified that poverty and hunger are going to force his parents to pawn him and his siblings off to relatives.

Braddock then says: “Yeah, well, things ain’t easy at the moment, Jay. You’re right. There’s a lot of people worse off than what we are. And just ’cause things ain’t easy, that don’t give you the excuse to take what’s not yours, does it? That’s stealing, right? We don’t steal. No matter what happens, we don’t steal. Not ever. You got me?”

There’s the old-time, Ten Commandments morality at work, the clear and simple rebuttal when we’re tempted to take what doesn’t belong to us. Rather than cheat, students can choose to study harder and let the chips fall where they may. Rather than pilfer time from employers or pad an expense account, workers can perform their job to the best of their abilities and return home able to look themselves in the mirror.

No matter what happens, we don’t steal.

Not ever.

Correction: A previous version of this article misspelled the name of Tony Lentini. The Epoch Times regrets the error. 

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.