It turns out shoplifting isn’t spiraling out of control, but lawmakers are pushing for tougher penalties for low-level and nonviolent crimes anyway.

It turns out shoplifting isn’t spiraling out of control, but lawmakers are pushing for tougher penalties for low-level and nonviolent crimes anyway.

Over the last couple of years, it seemed that America was experiencing a shoplifting epidemic. Videos of people brazenly stealing merchandise from retailers often went viral; chains closed some of their stores and cited a rise in theft as the primary reason; and drugstores such as CVS and Walgreens started locking up more of their inventory, including everyday items like toothpaste, soaps, and snacks. Lawmakers from both major parties called for, and in some cases even implemented, more punitive law enforcement policies aimed at bucking the apparent trend.

But evidence of a spike in shoplifting, it turns out, was mostly anecdotal. In fact, there’s little data to suggest that there’s a nationwide problem in need of an immediate response from city councils or state legislatures. Instead, what America seems to be experiencing is less of a shoplifting wave and more of a moral panic.

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Now, those more forgiving criminal justice policies are at risk, in part because of a perceived trend that appears to have been overblown.

  • QuarterSwede@lemmy.world
    418·
    11 months ago

    Data is only going to show who they know about. That’s probably 20% of all actual shoplifting. I had a hard enough time getting my team to report shoplifting when observed due to, “it happens all the time, I don’t have time to report it” or the like. The data is definitely not close to accurate.

    • ieatpillowtags@lemm.ee
      10·
      11 months ago

      But the lack of reporting hasn’t changed, has it? So if the old numbers and new numbers are both underreported, can’t we still compare them and see a decline?

    • BradleyUffner@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      11 months ago

      If only 20% is reported, and the reported number is going down, that also means the unreported 80% is going down too. That’s just how fractions and ratios work.

    • Habahnow
      32·
      11 months ago

      You’re right. Consistency is key. In new york apparently shoplifting reports went from 8 to 20% which could be part of the reason for the increased numbers

    • fallingcats@discuss.tchncs.de
      1·
      11 months ago

      Come on you know that has to be false. The stores know how much they ordered and how much of it they sold. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t even know how much to order next time.

      The only way they wouldn’t know how much was actually stolen is, if stolen goods are a rounding error of what they throw out day to day. (In which case we have a much more significant problem of Corporate waste on our hands)

      • QuarterSwede@lemmy.world
        1·
        11 months ago

        People, yes, people still do count audits daily, at least where I worked. They also still do inventory audits regularly yearly/2x year/2x every other year depending on the volume of the store.

        Throwing things out does happen but they budget for that daily/weekly/ and so on. Theft is harder to budget for especially when it’s changing. This is mostly what the giants are complaining about when they say theft is to blame for x,y,z.

          • QuarterSwede@lemmy.world
            1·
            11 months ago

            You haven’t ever done inventory management I take it. Both are true.

            People can’t count all the inventory in a big box store of 40,000 SKUs daily, weekly, or monthly. That’s why they have usually have a yearly, etc inventory as well (and even then it’s not 100% accurate). This is exactly why you can see on the site that they have 2 in stock but when you get there the shelf is empty (let’s assume no one actually bought the item while you were in route).