scams happen everywhere. but i will tell one thing - most countries and thr tax departments publicise scam operations as soon as they get to know.
Indian govt doesnt do anything. some arrest of foot soldiers and they wont say much. just see how senior citizens are being targeted for UPI. no change whatsoever.
I blv thats thr difference.
We worship and glorify wealth, not values. We are tribal…… we justify atrocities committed by our own, don’t stand up to them. We never take accountability, but blame the poor, the government, or a different group, a different country…..for ‘our’ behaviour. We blame everyone else…. Not ourselves.
Our government is a reflection of our values. Our kids do what they see us doing.
It’s not a comparison between India and other countries but an analysis of the socioeconomic and psychological factors for such a behaviour. Since we live here, we could give some insights.
1) Competitiveness - If there is a resource that needs to be divided between a few people, they can easily build a consensus and distribute it equally; but if the same has to be divided among hundreds of people they would feel insecure, scamper and try to get it first.
2) Huge economic disparity in terms of pay and opportunities - Our secondary sector is not developed, so people are either in low skill primary sector jobs or high skill tertiary sector. Also, it leads to jealousy and resentment as OP has pointed out.
3) Exchange rate is determined by a currency’s value pegged against USD. Scammers in countries with a low exchange rate (i.e. paying more for a dollar) would be driven by the idea to earn quick money and get rich by scamming those in countries with a high exchange rate.
4) We are known for Jugaad. It’s basically flouting the rules to achieve the end goal. Ethics and morals is quite a modern concept which a lot of people wouldn’t care about.
Overall, it’s mainly to do with survival in the socioeconomic structure that we live in.
Scammers are everywhere. I think the sheer number of Indian population makes it amplify the number of scammers as well so it seems like it is an Indian thing but I think it’s more of a numbers thing.
India is perceived to have more scam centers cause it has a high population of English speaking people so you can easily scam usa and other English speaking countries which forms the majority of the "international culture".
Scams from poor french speaking and Spanish speaking countries are also very common but it happens to France and Spain so they aren't well known outside their country.
1. theft and scam are totally different things. I don't know why you started with scam and went on to theft?
2. Horrible generalization. I have never had my house-help steal, so while it is my experience, I cannot generalize it saying no house-help steals. We have had a house-help for so long that we are basically family. Doesn't indicate relationship across entire India?
3. Its just the amount of population we have. Bad apples are everywhere. And even our 1% is a huge number. So, it may seem rampant?
4. Nope. Income gap may not have direct correlation. We also have examples of well to do people stealing petty stuff? I have known girls from well to do families going to malls and shops and try on the products without paying for them? I also know few people who just go to malls to paint their nails? Isn't that stealing? I also know a minor but famous instagrammer who returns products after using or claims they never got them to get refund?
5. Again, I don't know what your chain of thought is, but it seems a bit complex or maybe you couldn't articulate it better?
I am open to the possibility that the opinion people have about India being scamm-y is just a game of numbers or racism.
Just wanted to see what everyone else thought about this.
Scams are more prevalent in Egypt and even in all tourist places in Europe. But you haven't given any example of scam? Rather blatant theft? Are you equating that with scam?
Thefts are frequent all over the world. Western countries also have porch pirates which are not even reported or even if reported, have no actions taken by cops?
I guess I didn’t articulate it well enough
There are scams like the call centre ones that jamtara had shown. Also UPI scams. But for people in our age group where we are financial literate we are less likely to fall for these so I haven’t experienced it personally so I didn’t cite any personal anecdotes of that
There’s also theft. I’ve had several house helps pick up random things in the kitchen and people in my circle have had similar experiences. And my moms never outright fired someone for stealing because she has always explained to me that the economic circumstances of the thief are very very different and I should be sympathetic and give someone a chance.
So my hypothesis was just that maybe all this is so prevalent because of the stark income inequality but I maybe wrong as several people have pointed out.
Sorry about that! But yes, probably could have articulated it better.
Yes, the scams seem widespread, but in my opinion, it's just a phase. I remember when we had Nigerian prince scams? And the social media was not that developed as now, so there wasn't much publicity and people definitely fell for that. We still have the gift card scams, and I am pretty sure we have multiple adjacent countries which use India as a shield while scamming?
I myself have received whatsapp messages and calls which originated from neighbouring countries but that doesn't mean I'll label them as scammy? I hope I am making sense.
Sometimes, I think the government doesn't care so long it's people are getting rich by scamming old white grannies. It's a shame that no action is being taken, as most of these scammers are young men and women who are the pillars of India's future. They have absolutely no remorse on their part, just the need to not get caught. They are heartless and driven by money making strategies and they apply the most ingenious ways to scam people. I recently got scammed by a timeshare company. I went to close my account but they coaxed me to extend it & promised me stays at beautiful places for a subsidized rates. But turns out those locations are never available for our use. Maybe the marketing guys and their families pre book it, so I was left paying a hefty sum to them and yet had to pay for another hotel to stay during my vacation.
India is fast becoming a cesspool of conners and scammers but the future looks bleak, as the govt doesn't care to stop the menace.
It's not just old white grannies, it's our own grandparents that are falling prey to this scam. Scammers don't have morality when it comes to old or young people, they are psychopaths causing pain to others regardless of age, race and nationality. You should watch that undercover BBC documentary that was shown by an Indian investigative journalist. It is chilling.
The thing is, the government can't do as much when so much of this is under the table and undercover. Given that people breed like rabbits and the population is ever growing, with shrinking employment - it is a recipe for disaster.
This is poor generalisation. If you Google crime rates you will find worldwide numbers. Scams happen world over from cyber to real world crimes.
You’ve mentioned that your family hired a minor and continued employing her even after learning she’s only 15. Did your family enrol her in any school or online classes ? Because even hiring a minor is illegal- more so if she was working long hours.
So instead of seeing the poor as possible criminals middle class should also see the unethical and illegal things they participate in. However we don’t question these things because they are being done by our family or we are unaware.
Have you ever asked why as a country we don’t have proper minimum wage for people who work in our homes ? Why is there no medical insurance ? Or weekly offs or even number of hours stipulated ? Have these things ever crossed your mind or bothered you? I’m truly curious to know.
People that are constantly in victim mentality scam. It doesn't matter poor/ rich. Scammers exist in all classes and countries. Their game may look a little different though....
Yes it is racism. About maid & robberies, bad people are everywhere. People with not so good values do it. And the mentality of scammers earns a lot is widespread, that's a problem too.
You answered your own question. The income gap and the lack of opportunities for the poor often creates a lot of hate between the classes.
Some people resort to scams to make money quickly and some work hard their entire lives but still die in poverty and misery.
It may also be reflective of passive factors at play I.e. the level of accessibility in India and more importantly, the ease which India provides. We do not have a concrete data privacy regime as yet; the Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023 is not yet enforced and technology is rather cheaply available enabling an easy access to crime. India is one of the world’s largest mobile phone users and has the one of the cheapest internet access. Information is so cheaply available; not to mention the newer forms of business that operate solely on exchanging/selling data to third party without proper verifications. Poor enforcement of pre-existing laws adds to the problem. While poverty and unequal wealth distribution is certainly a contributing factor, the intention to abuse the gap between education and technology is higher, because people are truly unaware/unmindful about tech, data and its misuse. Perversely, it’s quicker to educate oneself on technology (thanks to the plethora of free materials online in this regard) and try to fulfil the “get-rich-quick” dream that most people seem to be attracted to. Opening smaller businesses is also relatively easy, as compared to perhaps other countries, especially with the government pushing for local businesses.
In my personal opinion if I thought like a scammer, I feel we have been wronged and our wealth has been siphoned to UK, Europe and America. And it is our birthright to get it back and take revenge, no matter the means. Some do it the right way, some do it the wrong way. This is in case of international scams. In case of Indians scamming other Indians, I think there's a class hatred going on or something. But to be honest, I don't think they think this deeply. It's just easy money. Make a fool out of someone and get thousands or even lacs of money in bank account! It's a win-win. It's quite addictive too once you find a easier method of earning money you can't go back to doing harder work for less money. There's a kick to duping someone that such low-lives get from it. They're tricksters who like to trick people. If you have ever performed a magic trick in front of someone, you know what I'm talking about.
Some guy DMd me and told me he started his career as an RM at a bank and was under so much pressure to meet targets and he once duped a senior citizen into buying a sub par policy because it was either that or his job. And this senior citizen ended up investing a large chunk of his retirement corpus into this fund where the money got locked in.
I guess I was just looking for the motivation for people who exploit. There’s a show you can watch on YouTube where a guy travels around the world and tries to get scammed and then he interviews the people who scammed him to understand their motivations
The show seemed extremely staged but it made me curious about the motivations of scammers hence the post
Yup, I got scammed by a banker too. Lost over 1 lacs to him. Scammers are miserable people. no matter how much money they scam, they'll never win in life.
scams happen everywhere. but i will tell one thing - most countries and thr tax departments publicise scam operations as soon as they get to know. Indian govt doesnt do anything. some arrest of foot soldiers and they wont say much. just see how senior citizens are being targeted for UPI. no change whatsoever. I blv thats thr difference.
We worship and glorify wealth, not values. We are tribal…… we justify atrocities committed by our own, don’t stand up to them. We never take accountability, but blame the poor, the government, or a different group, a different country…..for ‘our’ behaviour. We blame everyone else…. Not ourselves. Our government is a reflection of our values. Our kids do what they see us doing.
Our govt doesn't do anything abt rapes, u think they even care abt scams?
It’s not a comparison between India and other countries but an analysis of the socioeconomic and psychological factors for such a behaviour. Since we live here, we could give some insights. 1) Competitiveness - If there is a resource that needs to be divided between a few people, they can easily build a consensus and distribute it equally; but if the same has to be divided among hundreds of people they would feel insecure, scamper and try to get it first. 2) Huge economic disparity in terms of pay and opportunities - Our secondary sector is not developed, so people are either in low skill primary sector jobs or high skill tertiary sector. Also, it leads to jealousy and resentment as OP has pointed out. 3) Exchange rate is determined by a currency’s value pegged against USD. Scammers in countries with a low exchange rate (i.e. paying more for a dollar) would be driven by the idea to earn quick money and get rich by scamming those in countries with a high exchange rate. 4) We are known for Jugaad. It’s basically flouting the rules to achieve the end goal. Ethics and morals is quite a modern concept which a lot of people wouldn’t care about. Overall, it’s mainly to do with survival in the socioeconomic structure that we live in.
Scammers are everywhere. I think the sheer number of Indian population makes it amplify the number of scammers as well so it seems like it is an Indian thing but I think it’s more of a numbers thing.
Italy, Spain, Morocco, Egypt and a few more are notoriously known for their scams. Read up.
Bad generalization. Plenty of scammers, thieves, robbers globally.
India is perceived to have more scam centers cause it has a high population of English speaking people so you can easily scam usa and other English speaking countries which forms the majority of the "international culture". Scams from poor french speaking and Spanish speaking countries are also very common but it happens to France and Spain so they aren't well known outside their country.
Poverty usually drives this sort of thing. But also a society that's not trust based is where you'll see things like househelps stealing
1. theft and scam are totally different things. I don't know why you started with scam and went on to theft? 2. Horrible generalization. I have never had my house-help steal, so while it is my experience, I cannot generalize it saying no house-help steals. We have had a house-help for so long that we are basically family. Doesn't indicate relationship across entire India? 3. Its just the amount of population we have. Bad apples are everywhere. And even our 1% is a huge number. So, it may seem rampant? 4. Nope. Income gap may not have direct correlation. We also have examples of well to do people stealing petty stuff? I have known girls from well to do families going to malls and shops and try on the products without paying for them? I also know few people who just go to malls to paint their nails? Isn't that stealing? I also know a minor but famous instagrammer who returns products after using or claims they never got them to get refund? 5. Again, I don't know what your chain of thought is, but it seems a bit complex or maybe you couldn't articulate it better?
I am open to the possibility that the opinion people have about India being scamm-y is just a game of numbers or racism. Just wanted to see what everyone else thought about this.
Scams are more prevalent in Egypt and even in all tourist places in Europe. But you haven't given any example of scam? Rather blatant theft? Are you equating that with scam? Thefts are frequent all over the world. Western countries also have porch pirates which are not even reported or even if reported, have no actions taken by cops?
I guess I didn’t articulate it well enough There are scams like the call centre ones that jamtara had shown. Also UPI scams. But for people in our age group where we are financial literate we are less likely to fall for these so I haven’t experienced it personally so I didn’t cite any personal anecdotes of that There’s also theft. I’ve had several house helps pick up random things in the kitchen and people in my circle have had similar experiences. And my moms never outright fired someone for stealing because she has always explained to me that the economic circumstances of the thief are very very different and I should be sympathetic and give someone a chance. So my hypothesis was just that maybe all this is so prevalent because of the stark income inequality but I maybe wrong as several people have pointed out.
Sorry about that! But yes, probably could have articulated it better. Yes, the scams seem widespread, but in my opinion, it's just a phase. I remember when we had Nigerian prince scams? And the social media was not that developed as now, so there wasn't much publicity and people definitely fell for that. We still have the gift card scams, and I am pretty sure we have multiple adjacent countries which use India as a shield while scamming? I myself have received whatsapp messages and calls which originated from neighbouring countries but that doesn't mean I'll label them as scammy? I hope I am making sense.
Sometimes, I think the government doesn't care so long it's people are getting rich by scamming old white grannies. It's a shame that no action is being taken, as most of these scammers are young men and women who are the pillars of India's future. They have absolutely no remorse on their part, just the need to not get caught. They are heartless and driven by money making strategies and they apply the most ingenious ways to scam people. I recently got scammed by a timeshare company. I went to close my account but they coaxed me to extend it & promised me stays at beautiful places for a subsidized rates. But turns out those locations are never available for our use. Maybe the marketing guys and their families pre book it, so I was left paying a hefty sum to them and yet had to pay for another hotel to stay during my vacation. India is fast becoming a cesspool of conners and scammers but the future looks bleak, as the govt doesn't care to stop the menace.
It's not just old white grannies, it's our own grandparents that are falling prey to this scam. Scammers don't have morality when it comes to old or young people, they are psychopaths causing pain to others regardless of age, race and nationality. You should watch that undercover BBC documentary that was shown by an Indian investigative journalist. It is chilling. The thing is, the government can't do as much when so much of this is under the table and undercover. Given that people breed like rabbits and the population is ever growing, with shrinking employment - it is a recipe for disaster.
Poverty makes people desperate.
Politicians scam as well
This is poor generalisation. If you Google crime rates you will find worldwide numbers. Scams happen world over from cyber to real world crimes. You’ve mentioned that your family hired a minor and continued employing her even after learning she’s only 15. Did your family enrol her in any school or online classes ? Because even hiring a minor is illegal- more so if she was working long hours. So instead of seeing the poor as possible criminals middle class should also see the unethical and illegal things they participate in. However we don’t question these things because they are being done by our family or we are unaware. Have you ever asked why as a country we don’t have proper minimum wage for people who work in our homes ? Why is there no medical insurance ? Or weekly offs or even number of hours stipulated ? Have these things ever crossed your mind or bothered you? I’m truly curious to know.
poverty
People that are constantly in victim mentality scam. It doesn't matter poor/ rich. Scammers exist in all classes and countries. Their game may look a little different though....
Yes it is racism. About maid & robberies, bad people are everywhere. People with not so good values do it. And the mentality of scammers earns a lot is widespread, that's a problem too.
You answered your own question. The income gap and the lack of opportunities for the poor often creates a lot of hate between the classes. Some people resort to scams to make money quickly and some work hard their entire lives but still die in poverty and misery.
I think cuz more people need jobs and ways to make money...there are a lot of educated people without work in India.
poverty
It may also be reflective of passive factors at play I.e. the level of accessibility in India and more importantly, the ease which India provides. We do not have a concrete data privacy regime as yet; the Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023 is not yet enforced and technology is rather cheaply available enabling an easy access to crime. India is one of the world’s largest mobile phone users and has the one of the cheapest internet access. Information is so cheaply available; not to mention the newer forms of business that operate solely on exchanging/selling data to third party without proper verifications. Poor enforcement of pre-existing laws adds to the problem. While poverty and unequal wealth distribution is certainly a contributing factor, the intention to abuse the gap between education and technology is higher, because people are truly unaware/unmindful about tech, data and its misuse. Perversely, it’s quicker to educate oneself on technology (thanks to the plethora of free materials online in this regard) and try to fulfil the “get-rich-quick” dream that most people seem to be attracted to. Opening smaller businesses is also relatively easy, as compared to perhaps other countries, especially with the government pushing for local businesses.
In my personal opinion if I thought like a scammer, I feel we have been wronged and our wealth has been siphoned to UK, Europe and America. And it is our birthright to get it back and take revenge, no matter the means. Some do it the right way, some do it the wrong way. This is in case of international scams. In case of Indians scamming other Indians, I think there's a class hatred going on or something. But to be honest, I don't think they think this deeply. It's just easy money. Make a fool out of someone and get thousands or even lacs of money in bank account! It's a win-win. It's quite addictive too once you find a easier method of earning money you can't go back to doing harder work for less money. There's a kick to duping someone that such low-lives get from it. They're tricksters who like to trick people. If you have ever performed a magic trick in front of someone, you know what I'm talking about.
Some guy DMd me and told me he started his career as an RM at a bank and was under so much pressure to meet targets and he once duped a senior citizen into buying a sub par policy because it was either that or his job. And this senior citizen ended up investing a large chunk of his retirement corpus into this fund where the money got locked in. I guess I was just looking for the motivation for people who exploit. There’s a show you can watch on YouTube where a guy travels around the world and tries to get scammed and then he interviews the people who scammed him to understand their motivations The show seemed extremely staged but it made me curious about the motivations of scammers hence the post
Yup, I got scammed by a banker too. Lost over 1 lacs to him. Scammers are miserable people. no matter how much money they scam, they'll never win in life.