The United States has roughly two million people in jail or prison-- and almost none of them are there for stealing wages from their workers, despite the fact that as Kim Bobo highlights in her book, millions of people have wages illegally stolen from them. In fact, customers of businesses go to jail for shoplifting -- 360 people are in jail for life in California for shoplifting under that state's three strikes law -- but low-wage employers steal thousands of dollars from individual poor employees in violation of minimum wage and hour laws with almost zero chance of jail time.

I would ask why a crime involving millions of people and tens of billions of dollars stolen each year is so poorly enforced and so widely ignored in the media. But the answer is unfortunately obvious. Rich people stealing from the poor is just not considered a serious crime. White collar criminals go to jail for stealing from middle class and other rich people, but the working poor may be stolen from pretty much at will, with at most a tiny monetary fine at stake even if wage theft is actually investigated in court. That is the scandal that Bobo's book outlines-- and will never get the same coverage as the crimes of Madoff or others who steal from the middle class and other rich.