Late last year I watched someone swipe an entire shelf of cosmetics/facial products from a downtown Walgreens and saunter out while the clerk yelled at her, "Yo

Late last year I watched someone swipe an entire shelf of cosmetics/facial products from a downtown Walgreens and saunter out while the clerk yelled at her, "You must feel great about yourself!" And, no, this wasn't a homeless person or drug addict, AFAICT, just a well-groomed 20-something young woman who jumped into a car waiting for her outside. That Walgreens employee told me that nothing happens. No police report. Nothing except, presumably, a note to corporate. Her sentiments were echoed by another employee at the time. And both explained how much worse things have gotten. They were incredibly pissed because they felt so utterly helpless. While this was last year, it was at a Walgreens that I've been frequenting for years, and from what I gather from some of the chattier employees, things are still pretty bad, and altogether definitely much worse than before COVID. They have a security guard on duty more often now, but they also have significantly reduced hours. I find it odd that people expect Walgreens to open up their books to prove the increased theft. In other contexts that's called blaming the victim. And why should I care if Walgreens is taking the opportunity to downsize at the same time? That's the epitome of whataboutism. But in any event, AFAICT, Walgreens and Target have been privately more transparent with some of the local politicians. Public transparency would just be a lose-lose from the perspective of these large corporations, especially in the current media environment where left wing social activists will blame them regardless ("Oh, look at how many millions they've been extracting from our community!") while the right wing will try to further make martyrs out of them--theft notwithstanding, not the kind of public persona these companies want. Regarding insurance, I wouldn't be surprised if Walgreens and Target self-insure in situations like this. What I do know is that after a spate of burglaries along the commercial strip in my Outer Richmond neighborhood, the local business association (the president is the owner of a restaurant we frequent, and we're on some of her mailing lists) ran a funding drive to help those businesses recover. The implication seemed to be that either the businesses lacked the necessary insurance coverage altogether, or it fell short of what they needed. Which wouldn't at all be surprising to me. (Also wouldn't be surprising if not every business filed a police report. When nearly every business on both sides of the street, up-and-down three+ blocks is burgled in the span of two weeks, what would be the point? Even an insurer might not even care at that point; it'd be like asking each and every claimant to prove an earthquake or hurricane.)