That's typical! Working really hard for little gain!
I sometimes do the same kinds of things. I won't take the time to go get the right tool for something, or I try to take a short-cut, and then it makes the task harder in the long run. I call that: "Being too lazy to do it the easy way!" And I'm guilty of it quite often.
On the other hand, I don't mind spending hours tweaking control system programs to make things run very well without operator intervention to save myself labor in the future. Ain't automation wonderful? I guess I'm trading doing something I enjoy for doing things I don't enjoy. So as you said, there's probably the thrill and pleasure of "getting something for nothing" for the thieves, even though they may work really hard at it!
And as
@bababouy pointed out above, once someone has a conviction on their record, getting a job will be all that much more difficult. So that may help keep people trapped in a cycle of crime.
And, of course, there's drug addiction. That will affect the way folks think and also affect their life in such a way that it may be difficult to hold down a "regular" job. I have always been a night-owl, but I've been lucky enough to find jobs that allow me to more or less keep my own hours, and I prefer to work alone most of the time if the task requires something like programming, circuit design, or PC board layout, etc. And ironically, that's probably because I really like being with people and am too easily distracted. Whatever.
I read once that when tested, some large percentage of repeat inmates of some prison system showed that they made the same few logical thinking errors over and over. I'm not sure if that's something that can be learned or taught, or it it ends up being something that's just hard-wired in from the beginning. As I understand it, one of the "thinking errors" the inmates often make is that they actually fail to see anything wrong with stealing or doing harm to someone else. They're sociopathic. They really truly don't see that what they're doing is wrong. They lack empathy. And this can often be seen in people even when they're very very young.
Still, I've always felt that kids growing up should be forced to take at least three logic classes during their public education.
One in grade school, to get them familiar with the basics of symbolic logic and logical thinking. Then another in middle school. And finally a more advanced one in high school.
If people were taught to think logically from an early age, they'd recognize common tricks used to fool them in advertising, politics, etc. And they'd make better decisions all through life.
But I'm also sure that there would be a lot of variation in the ways people think due to genetics and various environmental effects. And that's actually a good thing. So while the logic training would be good, it obviously wouldn't solve all problems, or prevent all crime, etc.
I hate thieves, too, but thinking about everything logically, I'd say that I cannot actually judge anyone. To me, to be able to judge someone, you must be able to put yourself completely in their shoes, so to speak. And to truly do that, you'd have to share their exact brain makeup as well as their exact upbringing and life experience. And thus, you'd end up being the exact same person, so by definition, you'd do the same things given the same circumstances.
That doesn't mean that I don't want to stop thieves, or better yet, catch them. But I'm not sure where the glee for me comes from in any of that because it seems inconsistent when I examine it carefully.
So logically, catching them rather than just deterring them really comes down to hopefully preventing them from hurting anyone else in the future if possible rather than punishing them.
But again, emotionally, I really like the idea of punishment! But I don't know why that is. I guess that's just something I can't rationalize - but there it is! I'd like to electrify that fence between the time when they filed the ties and when they came back to steal it, if only to see the effect. I know that's not right, but that's the way it is!
