Retail Theft in America

While all eyes are riveted on the violent insurrection taking place in France today, America is still suffering its own insurrection.

Of course, the French insurrection is being led by Muslim migrants. Since France, as noted yesterday, has opened its doors to more Muslim migrants than anywhere else, one might say that it is paying for its misjudgment.

As of today, migrants are firebombing libraries and municipal buildings in France. The French police have taken to driving through the streets shooting at insurrectionists.

In time the French government is going to crush the insurrection, with due violence. And it might very well figure out a way to deport a group of migrants that are not seeking opportunity, but have become an invading army. The migrants want to make France Muslim. I do not believe that they will succeed.

Meanwhile, on the home front, blue American cities are suffering their own insurrection. Rampant shoplifting has become the order of the day in these cities, with police standing down and with prosecutors declining to prosecute.

The current tally is $100,000,000,000 in retail losses. Jared Klickstein reports in The New York Post:

The stories are everywhere: Walmart store closures in Portland and Chicago; an epidemic of drug store thefts in New York. In Baltimore, a “landmark” grocery store shuts its doors after nearly 25 years in a community desperate for fresh food.

While in San Francisco, reports of big-box chains abandoning its downtown have become near-daily occurrences.

The cause: rampant, often organized, and seemingly consequenceless shoplifting.

Indeed, the US is deep in what many are calling an epidemic of thefts that cost retailers nearly $100 billion in 2021.

Stores are being closed and people no longer have easy access to food. We are not allowed to say who is committing all of these crimes, but the groups whose members think that they have a right to steal what others have earned are suffering significant reputational damage.

For white people, letting this happen is a form of penance. It manifests an advanced case of white guilt. So, crime has become a staple of everyday retail life in these cities. And no one dares do anything to stop it.

Besides, for many drug addicts, it beats holding down a job. Klickstein recounts his experience as a drug addict:

Across the political spectrums, analysts and academics endlessly debate the causes of this scourge, but for me, the roots could not be clearer.

“Working” just four hours a day, I would “earn” up to $350 in untaxed cash, which allowed me to maintain my drug habit for over a year.

Items that are typically “boosted” and then sold to stolen merchandise dealers (aka “fences”) are mostly health and beauty products, over-the-counter medications, and even food.

And, of course, defunding the police and pro-criminal prosecutors have abetted the problem.

But following the 2020 push to defund the police and the subsequent loss of officers, professional shoplifters now operate in public and with clear impunity.

Every day, videos emerge of robbers blithely filling duffle bags as store employees watch helplessly out of fear of violence or legal retribution.

Rather than try and prevent pilfering— which was once considered part of their jobs — workers have become impotent enablers of a new criminal class that functions seemingly without conscience or consequence.

Of course, everyone pays. Not only have major chains closed up shop, but in those places where stores are open, the companies have installed plexiglass barriers to prevent pilfering.

Unsurprisingly, actual paying customers have become fed up with everyday staples now barricaded behind plexiglass panels. In fact, it’s common for item sales to drop 15-25% once they are locked away, which only pushes customers to purchase these items online.

Already battered by the dominance of retailers like Amazon, brick-and-mortar chains must now contend with both relentless shoplifting — and those shoplifted goods resold, with no little irony, on Amazon.

With police battered from combating organized theft, and customers frustrated by the retailers’ “lock everything away” approach, professional shoplifting has begun to appear intractable and unsolvable in many cities across the country.

No wonder some New York City shops have even begun installing anti-theft devices on $6 pints of ice cream.

To be fair, New York City’s current mayor, Eric Adams, is trying to address the problem. He is even suggesting putting kiosks in stores in order to persuade thieves to get mental health counseling. If that is not pathetic, the word has no meaning.

Klickstein comments that the only solution to the problem is arrest and prosecution:

Breaking this cycle requires detox and long-term drug treatment — even for those who refuse it.

In tandem, prosecutorial leniency, and no-cash bail must be abolished if we’re to have any chance of returning to a system where products are actually purchased, rather than pilfered.

Sure, booths offering access to social services can help those who seek it.

But no matter how shiny or sophisticated, no electronic kiosk would have prevented me from shoplifting to feed my $350-a-day heroin and cocaine habit.

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