his foot soldiers sales performance, it was their force of personality that really counted-more than it would for, say, a shortstop.) And finally, once     you come to the sad realization that you will never make it to the top, you will quit the tournament. (Some people hang on longer than others-witness the graying "actors" who wait tables in New York- but people generally get the message quite early.) Most of J. T.s foot soldiers were unwilling to stay foot soldiers for long after they realized they werent advancing. Especially once the shooting started. After several relatively peaceful years, J. T.s gang got involved in a turf war with a neighboring gang. Drive-by shootings became a daily event. For a foot soldier-the gangs man on the street-this development was particularly dangerous. The nature of the business demanded that customers be able to find him easily and quickly; if he hid from the other gang, he couldnt sell his crack. Until the gang war, J. T.s foot soldiers had been willing to balance the risky, low-paying job with the reward of advancement. But as one foot soldier told Venkatesh, he now wanted to be compensated for the added risk: "Would you stand around here when all this shit is going on? No, right? So if I gonna be asked to put my life on the line, then front me the cash, man. Pay me more cause it aint worth my time to be here when theyre warring." J. T. hadnt wanted this war. For one thing, he was forced to pay his foot soldiers higher wages because of the added risk. Far worse, gang warfare was bad for business. If Burger King and McDonalds launch a price war to gain market share, they partly make up in volume what they lose in price. (Nor is anyone getting shot.) But with a gang war, sales plummet because customers are so scared of the violence that they wont come out in the open to buy their crack. In every way, war was expensive for J. T. So why did he start the war? As a matter of fact, he didnt. It was his foot soldiers who started it. It turns out that a crack boss didnt have as