Novelist Charles Dickens may have been on target about smart criminals, according to the recent work of a University of California, Davis, sociologist. Under different circumstances, the Artful Dodger could have been a successful -- and thoroughly respectable -- entrepreneur. Some of the same attributes that create successful, legitimate business people may operate in the criminal world, argue Bill McCarthy, an associate professor of sociology at UC Davis, and co-author professor John Hagan of Northwestern University. Their study, published this week in the journal Social Forces, has broad implications for public policy, McCarthy said. "Some offenders score high on measures of competence, they're willing to work with other people and they make decisions that increase their earnings," McCarthy said. "We bear a considerable cost imprisoning people like this who could make a contribution in the legal economy." Borrowing ideas from economic theories about the attributes that contribute to prosperity in legitimate enterprises, the two authors report that people who were the most successful at crime have a strong desire to succeed, specialize, are risks-takers and are willing to work with others. And, importantly, they are competent. These conclusions were drawn from a study of drug selling among a sample of youths who lived on the streets of Vancouver and Toronto that McCarthy directed over the summer of 1992. About 475 homeless youth were interviewed about their criminal activities, financial successes and educational background, among other issues. The youth had an average age of between 19 and 20, and three-quarters were male. Although 75 percent were white, 15 percent were Native American and another 6 percent were African American. Nearly 60 percent had sold drugs at least once since they left home and had considerable exposure to drug selling, with an average of 12 drug-selling friends who could show them the ropes. Of the total, about 10 percent were actively specializing in drug sales. These young operators were doing much better than if they were slinging burgers, according to the statistics gathered. Their average daily illegal income was about $101 in 1992, or nearly three times the $37 a day -- before taxes and deductions -- that other homeless youth made doing legal work. "The economic restructuring that occurred in North America in the 1980s and early 90s undoubtedly encouraged some entrepreneurial youth to take up drug dealing," McCarthy and Hagan said. "Throughout this period, declines in inner-city employment opportunities resulted in substantial increases in unemployment and a drop in wages of 20 percent to 30 percent, particularly for males, the young, the under-educated and minorities." McCarthy and Hagan's study of criminal success is unusual in the field of criminology, said Christopher Uggen, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Minnesota who studies crime. Usually criminal theories emerge from studies of small groups of criminals, such as the ethnography of a particular gang. By detailing the lives of a few hundred drug dealers, McCarthy and Hagan are able to give a clearer picture of criminals on a number of different levels, thus widening the public understanding of what stimulates people to turn to crime. McCarthy and Hagan have offered a fledgling theory about criminals that examines not just the attributes for success in crime, but the interaction among them. Specifically, specializing in a task (in this case, selling marijuana), having a strong desire to succeed and a willingness to collaborate increase the probability that a person will do well. McCarthy and Hagan found that competence intensified and gave direction to specialization and collaboration for these drug dealers, increasing illegal earnings even more. They define competence as intellectual capacity, dependability and self-confidence. These attributes may not ensure long-term success however. McCarthy and Hagan note that in the long run drug dealers run the risk of addiction, victimization and imprisonment.