It seems every time I go into Walgreens, I have a discrepancy with the prices that are on the shelves and the prices that are rung up at the cash register.  I can understand if one or two items are on sale and  some codes were missed when programing them into the system.  These are  regular items with regular prices.  Only too often the price at the register can be anywhere from ten cents to $1.00 higher than the prices at the shelves.  Many people walk out of the store unaware that they were overcharged for many items.  This is not right.  They are taking money from you, as little as it is, without your knowledge.  Isn't that called picking someone's pocket in other instances?  The only difference is these are large corporations and it goes by another - more elegant - name like  programming error.  It happens to often to just be an error. 

Another set of pick pockets - more like rip off artists -  are credit card companies that charge exorbitant fees, sometimes unbeknown to the credit card holder.  In order to get an immediate boost in revenue, some credit card companies will change your due date in some very fine print on your statement and of course if you miss it you are charged an enormous fee of $40.00; multiply that by 100,000 customers and they just ripped off their customers to the tune of $4,000,000.00

ARM's - Adjustable Rate Mortgages, another form of highway robbery.  If this is not con artistry, it sure looks and smells like it.  They pull you in with a low rate.  "Here you go a low rate of 6% on a $200,000.00 mortgage.  Your monthly payment will be a steal  - only $1,200.00."  They let  you know that it's an adjustable mortgage, but they do not go into any detail about how high that rate can hike.  I think many people understood that their rate would adjust, but what took a lot of people back was the amount of points the rate adjusted by;  not a one or two point change, but in some cases,  some people's mortgages literally doubled and many were just shocked out of house and home.  Talk about highway robbery.  The only difference here is both parties loose.  The home owner walks away from his/her home, and the bank sells at a great loss to some investor, if they sell any at all. 

The question is, who is held accountable for these white collar transgressions?  Who is regulating these credit card companies and mortgage companies?  Who is paying the price for this white collar thievery?