At this point I should probably admit something - I really enjoy reading about fraud and fraudsters and the schemes they concoct. Fraud is, after all, a form of a confidence crime, or a "con job" in the contemporary vernacular. The person who creates a fraud scheme is a confidence man or, of course, a "con man." As the name suggests, to be a con man, you have to gain the confidence of your victim. You have to gain their trust and belief that you are working for their best interests while, at the same time, you are screwing them out of their hard earned money.
Only certain people can be con men. It takes a great deal of self belief and self confidence, not to mention a type of sociopathic and psychopathic personality, to be able to pull off a con job. A con man has to stay one step ahead of his mark to achieve his goals and then, move onto the next one. It is not an easy job.
Make no mistake about it - although I admire the work and the schemes of con artists, the people who pull off these schemes are criminals, pure and simple. They are stealing other people's money. Instead of using a gun or other physical force, the con man uses his wits. While this can be romanticized (and often is, witness movies like "The Sting" for an example of how Hollywood sometimes views this sort of thing), there is no denying that just like any other crime, there are victims. Conjobs do not leave "victimless" crimes - just ask the former workers of Enron.
But, like anyone who admires a good backstory, it is always interesting to look into cons and con jobs and find out more about them.
And, for the next topic, we will take a break from talking about different types of frauds and talk about the person who ran a fraud scheme so grand and enormous in scope that today his name is synonymous with its imitators.
I am referring to Charles Ponzi and the immortal "Ponzi Scheme." Charles Ponzi and the crime that will forever bear his name is the subject of our discussions for the next posts.
As always, have a great and fraud-free day.
http://www.tauskvega.com
------------->>>>>>>>>>>>>>>gene tausk
No comments:
Post a Comment