No, this puts "shoplifting" on the same level as "employee theft" and "literally just doing a bad job" in terms of losing $100 billion (this is actually a globa

No, this puts "shoplifting" on the same level as "employee theft" and "literally just doing a bad job" in terms of losing $100 billion (this is actually a global number) last year. IE, brick and mortar retail reported losing about $35 billion to shoplifting. Out of $6 TRILLION (Just in the US!) worth of brick and mortar retail sales in the same year, in an industry that claims 2% profit margins on the low ends. All the fuss over shoplifting is just noise. Consider that the same survey which produced those numbers also showed that a full 16% of ALL merchandise sold in retail is returned, yet we don't have news channels blaring all over that we are in a crisis of unfit products. It's a narrative, and a bad one, to blame greedy price increases on a STABLE total rate of shrink, one that has been roughly 1.5% for over a DECADE. The cost of shrink has been factored in to the price of goods forever.