They act like “shoplifting is up” is some mystery of human nature and not literally the free market doing exactly what it’s designed to do. Squeeze wages, jack prices, gut every safety net you can find, then act shocked pikachu face when people start taking matters into their own hands. This ain’t a morality crisis it’s a pricing signal. Crime stats are just capitalism’s blooper reel at this point.
weird, seems like there’s an easy way to avoid most of this - just sell things are fair prices
That’s just it, these companies are so detached from reality that they think they have fair prices. That’s why they’re all surprised_pikachu_face.png when shoplifting happens.
Shoplifting is a drop in the bucket compared to wage theft. Every one of these articles that doesn’t mention wage theft is a new reason to not trust the publication.
For me it’s just so obvious that if you bring up theft you should talk about all theft and the context of theft especially if the whole articles about economic impact of theft. Wage theft doesn’t sell advertisements I guess.
It’s not stealing if it’s food.
Locking up baby formula is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen in a grocery store. And yes, I’m including the time I witnessed someone using aisle 5 as a toilet seat. The baby formula was locked up in that same aisle and as a new father without sleep, I had to let it go right then and there. One person came by and was grossed out; but was immediately pulling down their pants to let out a turd as soon as I pointed to the disgusting site that is baby formula locked behind glass. They took it to another level and started smearing their shit on the glass screaming “If I cover this window in shit, no one else will have to see it!”
If I don’t have money to buy food there is no fucking way I’m going to starve to death. If I have to steal to feed myself then so be it. I’ll do my best and take from the big corps but if I’m in the middle of no-where I’ll kick your door down just to get some food. Survival and rational thinking take two different paths.
Imagine how much we would progress if everyone shoplifted for a week as protest.
No one has ever shoplifted food… ever.
If you see someone shoplifting… No you didn’t.
Yeah I am sure they really need that £40 jar of honey, bottle of fancy wine and the finest steaks…
I don’t see people stealing potatoes, but I see quite a few stealing the expensive stuff.
Oh hi Korhaka’s new account, this discussion has already been had and you embarrassed yourself there too. Complaining about luxury thefts on a story about some bacon.
The danger is the same, so you may as well treat yourself.
I would rather not live in a society full of rampant theft.
Welcome to capitalism!
I’d rather not live in a society where theft is necessary to survive
I agree with that. But stealing luxury products? That isn’t necessary to survive.
Talk to billionaires first.
Yet you do, from the top to the bottom. Don’t see you bitching about that, just poor people.
Didn’t you read?? People were stealing organic avocados and fresh multi grain toast, not gruel and powdered milk.
And yet you’re ignoring the rampant theft.
Then tell all the corpos to stop it.
So what are you doing to advocate for higher wages, universal healthcare, free education?
Well I live in the UK so we got that already
So in other words your personal anectode is completely worthless in a discussion about US shoplifting. Thanks, gtfo.
Maybe the higher wages has something to do with the discrepancy, innit? Fucking wanker.
So I don’t mean to shoplift, but since most big box stores barely have any employees working at them anymore and I have to do my own checkout, well, I’m sure that I sometimes forget to scan some things.
I accidentally scan all my items as bananas, because their system is so confusing
Surely you don’t scan the bananas as bananas though?..
I’ve never seen it. Nope. I see nothing.
30%? Wild.
Understandable; people are stressed for money. However, the costs of shoplifting are passed on to the other customers, which in turn increases inflation. it’s a short term fix for a bigger problem, and will create bigger issues when you are caught; a better idea is to vote for the right party (one that actually cares for people) or to become politically active.
No they don’t. They already charge as much as they think they can make money from. The price/demand curve is pretty basic microeconomics.
The whole thing is, what price maximizes the total revenue, given the supply/demand curve? Then if that revenue is high enough to pay for the costs of earning that revenue (which includes shrinkage), then the product is profitable.
Then it makes it on to shelves if it is profitable enough compared to other products, or if it will draw enough people in to buy other products to be worth losing the opportunity cost from putting that on the shelf vs something else.
So shoplifting does increase the price something needs to be to be profitable, but it doesn’t do anything to raise the price people are willing to spend on it. So it’ll more likely lead to closed stores, discontinued products, or added security measures (assuming those measures are less expensive than simply replacing the stolen products).
In some neighborhoods, they just shut down stores.
Still lineups of people ordering oat milk lahtays for $7.
This is a common myth spread by capitalists. They use the excuse of “shrink” to justify 10xing prices, when in reality there was never more than a miniscule amount of that 10xs total value stolen.
If they want people to stop stealing, they need to provide a better product.
To quote one of the more tolerable capitalists "The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates.”
Look at UK supermarket prices to see what happens when they are trying to compete on prices.
I could fill an entire sack with carrots and potatoes for less than the cost of a single pint at a pub.
If they want people to stop stealing, they need to provide a better product.
Like… people will stop stealing if the food is better?
People will stop stealing food if they have reasonable access to food.
So what’s the “better product” here? What are the stores supposed to do?
Shoplifting is not the same as piracy. The causes and solutions are different.
The stores pay their employees a living wage and stop price gouging food.
UK has both, and yet shoplifting is still rising.
It sounds like you have a very particular experience and relationship to the subject, HerbGrower? At a glance, the data seems to suggest something different. E.g., according to Uk food foundation prices for groceries in the UK have been rising (albeit more slowly recently), and many people in the UK experience food insecurity.
Offering a product cheaper doesn’t really make the product better. With piracy the argument is that people don’t steal content because they can’t afford it but because it easier to download it for free without DRM than to buy it and watch on official channels. It happened to me many times that I was unable to buy and open a book because of the DRM but managed to download pirated epub in minutes. I would gladly pay for them if I could. The “better product” here is content that is easier to access.
With food people steal because they can’t afford it, not because it’s more convenient to carry food in your pants than in your shopping cart. Lowering prices and raising wages would be great but it’s not the same as piracy and it’s not “offering a better product”.
Stop making retard breaking profits every year, cut prices to something reasonable. Hire enough employees.
I find its usually the better food that they are stealing. I don’t think wine is an essential product.
