this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2026
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I don't report shoplifting people either because they desperately need it while the CEO of the franchise earns millions. When shoplifting is a common thing forcing the store to put products behind locks, society has failed as too many of the population are struggling financially.
Yeah, the locking products up thing is not happening here at all (except for valuable electronics, jewellery etc obviously) but also most of everyone can comfortably afford the necessities around here
Same in my country. It only happens in countries with vast amounts of poverty.
This was back in 2023, but I once got the estimated losses from shoplifting from the four major UK supermarkets (Tesco, Asda, Morrisons and Sainsbury's) and compared them to the shareholder/investor payouts. In all four cases, the latter was greater and it wasn't even close.
It was 2020, covid was in full force, all prices went up. Ahold said they were forced to do so, due to extra shipping fees etc and shortages due to covid. Many people were struggling financially. Their personnel also couldn't get raises while they were more exposed to get covid, had to work more due to colleagues being ill. The store chain said the profits on products was minimal, that they were struggling not to sell products at a loss. That they had no choice but to raise prices, while also bleeding themselves.
Turns out that year they had more yearly profits than ever before. Check this chart.
I'm unable to steal. I'm too honest for that, my autistic brain just can't. But I so much believe companies like Ahold deserve to be stolen from. Fuck them.
If you're a good person, and someone desperately needs something, why don't you just offer to buy it for them? Why make them go through the indignity of having to risk shoplifting?
If they get away with it, the store will raise its prices to make up for the shortfall, and you'll be paying for it anyhow.
This is naive. Sure, in a perfect world everyone helps people in desperate situations or they have support structures that can help them. This is not that world. Sure some shopplifting is for unnecessary stuff but most of it is from desperation because people struggle to afford necessities. It is a much better approach to blame the systems and structures that lead to people having no other options rather than blaming the poor people just trying to get by.
By your logic why aren't you, presumably a good person, paying for every persons groceries who cant afford them. Is it because you are actually a bad person? No, its because that is neither feasible nor tenable. And the CEOs of large corporations actively work to maintain things as they are because they make incredible wealth.
As to increased prices, every corporate grocery store or big box store has insurance and works losses into their budgets. They can easily absorb it without increasing their costs. On the other hand do you know what the most common form of theft in the US is? Wage theft. So the same CEOs making bank also keep pay from employees who are already struggling.
In short, fuck the corps, shoplift if you need to, don't be a snitch if you see someone else.
No, you are naive. Yes, grocery stores do calculate losses into their budget and thus are able to absorb a certain amount, but you know who pays for it? Everyone who doesn't shoplift, by paying more than they'd need to so the store can afford the insurance policy. No store can absorb unlimited losses, they'll simply close up shop if they can't turn a profit, and then your neighborhood will turn into a food desert.
Cool strawman. Obviously unlimited losses would ruin anyone but that is impossible and most stores operate well within their expected loss margins, so markups are arbitrary or caused by inflation. Backing up a bit, you are again blaming the more vulnerable group in this. Be mad at the CEOs and politicians that keep people poor, not the poor people trying to survive. Crime drops in direct proportion to drops in poverty
Also, you keep repeating corporate propaganda. It is more common for these companies to use shoplifting as an excuse to close stores that they already intended to close rather than closing them because shoplifting was actually a problem.
Okay, so if unlimited losses are impossible, everyone should just steal, right?
That is the most bad faith interpretation of what i said. When i said it was impossible i meant that in reality the vast majority of people will not steal, not that everyone should steal all the time because there will never be consequences. And i am not saying that stealing is morally good in all cases. I am saying that large corporations, their executives and the politicians they fund keep people in poverty so they can become ultra wealthy from the record profits these companies make (weird they can make record profits while everyone is apparently stealing so much stuff from them), so yeah, if a poor person steals from one of these companies to get medicine they need or food they can't afford, i think they should and that we should not condemn them for it. I would rather a company lose a buck than someone go hungry. And even if it was true that it was happening at a scale where they had to increase prices, i would gladly pay that if it meant my neighbor could eat without being arrested. These companies are not struggling and theft of this nature does not happen on a scale to warrant any of their current interventions including increasing prices.
I find it interesting that you refuse to engage with my actual core argument and instead have opted for picking at random sentences. Engage with this: the systems that cause and deepen poverty are the problem, not the poor people tryong to survive. These systems are perpetuated by large corporations and the ultra wealthy, they are the ones you should be angry with. You are closer to the person stealing to survive than you are any billionaire.
Okay, in which cases would you say that stealing is morally good?
Please be as precise as possible. This is very important.
Literally gave a guy $100 once (everything in my wallet) so that he wouldn't need to keep begging in the parking lot. I was working minimum wage. Problem is, now I literally don't have enough money to do that again. Now see, maybe if the next person also did this, that might help solve the problem. Perhaps it might evolve into a community of people paying it forward and helping the brother next to them in a slowly strengthened network of support.
In other words, a much more expensive, unsustainable and unreliable version of a strong government funded social safety net.
Give a man a hundred dollars, he'll feed himself for a day. Teach a man how to make a hundred dollars... you know where I'm going with this.
So you're one of those "just get a job" idiots...
Maaaate. You're telling people they are naive, but you are the perfect example of what that word means.
How so?
You sound like a white guy, living in a reasonably rich country, who went to school then got a job, who never had a struggle in his life, who never saw other countries except for holiday destinations, who got his world info from populist politicians and sensation newspapers and Facebook like sources. How far off am I? You sound like you haven't seen anything from the real world.
So I, someone who also doesn't make much money, should use the little money I have extra to pay for others, while these stores make billions profit per year? You know how much people are poor? You're doing exactly what mega corporations do: blame the consumer. I do help out some friends of mine who are poor AF. But the issue is mega corps creating vast amounts of poverty out of greed.