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What really irritates me about shoplifting is that the honest among us subsidize the criminals. Inevitably, retailers and grocers raise prices due to increased

What really irritates me about shoplifting is that the honest among us subsidize the criminals. Inevitably, retailers and grocers raise prices due to increased theft, encouraging more theft, in a vicious spiral (I don't have proof of this; rather, it's an intuition). Also reminds me of drug use in sports.

smallgovt 7y ago
Well it doesn’t spiral out of control. It’ll reach an equilibrium where the grocer prices their goods to make an optimal profit given the rate of theft (which you’ve aptly pointed out increases with the price they choose).
dredmorbius 7y ago
Or the stores withdraw from that region. See: food deserts.
- gruez 7y ago
  > See: food deserts. they seem to be mostly as a result of lack of demand, not lack of supply. https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2017/12/political-incorrect-paper-day-food-deserts.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2017/12/po...
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    Multiple factors contribute. Paul Baran, inventor of packet-switched networks, added a footnote to a 1968 monograph noting that his parents' inner-city Philadelphia fire insurance had just been cancelled. The unavailability, or high cost, of insurance may prove fatal to both homeownership and businesses. https://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/P3780.html https://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/P3780.html (footnote, p. 7) Note too that Marginal Revolution, based at George Mason University, pushes an explicitly libertarian, market. fundamentalist, ideology. Cowan and Taborrok occasionally break type, but the exceptions prove the rule. I'd need to review the article in depth, but an immediate observation is that in a media-saturated, advertising-filled world, demand is anything but exogenous.
nickpsecurity 7y ago
"the honest among us subsidize the criminals." We in fact do: executives of companies with poor service, little innovation, and lots of fraud against consumers and employees. They take millions to tens of millions... typically goes up... despite others doing most of their work whose own income is minimized wherever possible. There's also thieves that make three to four digits a year taking some percentage of company earnings for themselves, too. I can't stand them either.

smallgovt 7y ago

Well it doesn’t spiral out of control. It’ll reach an equilibrium where the grocer prices their goods to make an optimal profit given the rate of theft (which you’ve aptly pointed out increases with the price they choose).

dredmorbius 7y ago

Or the stores withdraw from that region. See: food deserts.

gruez 7y ago
> See: food deserts. they seem to be mostly as a result of lack of demand, not lack of supply. https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2017/12/political-incorrect-paper-day-food-deserts.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2017/12/po...
- dredmorbius 7y ago
  Multiple factors contribute. Paul Baran, inventor of packet-switched networks, added a footnote to a 1968 monograph noting that his parents' inner-city Philadelphia fire insurance had just been cancelled. The unavailability, or high cost, of insurance may prove fatal to both homeownership and businesses. https://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/P3780.html https://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/P3780.html (footnote, p. 7) Note too that Marginal Revolution, based at George Mason University, pushes an explicitly libertarian, market. fundamentalist, ideology. Cowan and Taborrok occasionally break type, but the exceptions prove the rule. I'd need to review the article in depth, but an immediate observation is that in a media-saturated, advertising-filled world, demand is anything but exogenous.

nickpsecurity 7y ago

"the honest among us subsidize the criminals." We in fact do: executives of companies with poor service, little innovation, and lots of fraud against consumers and employees. They take millions to tens of millions... typically goes up... despite others doing most of their work whose own income is minimized wherever possible. There's also thieves that make three to four digits a year taking some percentage of company earnings for themselves, too. I can't stand them either.