[brandonmenc]

> when they create the kind of environment where theft is easy and common, it also doesn't feel right for the taxpayer to be on the hook.

This smacks of victim-blaming.

Would anyone suggest the company were at fault if we were not discussing Walmart?

[rustyfe]

That's a fair point. It's certainly wrong to blame the victim, although I feel like that diminishes when we're talking about _any_ company, not just Walmart.

Still, you're right to bring up the idea that I simply dislike Walmart and so would take whichever position is against them. I don't think that's what I'm doing, but it's an easy mental trap to fall into.

[brandonmenc]

> I feel like that diminishes when we're talking about _any_ company

Agree. I should've put scare quotes around "victim blaming."

[ahi]

If I leave my car unlocked with the keys in the ignition and it gets stolen, I am a victim. I don't deserve to be punished for a mistake. If I do it once a week, I am still a victim but also an idiot who doesn't deserve much sympathy.

Not all of this is theft either. Walmart puts their customers in danger by inadequately patrolling their stores.

[brandonmenc]

For your example to apply here, it would have to cost you money to lock your car.

[bsder]

> Would anyone suggest the company were at fault if we were not discussing Walmart?

There is a a difference between at fault and being stupid.

No one deserves to be mugged, but one does not walk through a slum, drunk, while waving a wallet around.

As for WalMart, it can do many things. Identifying known shoplifters and escorting them out. Following shoplifters back to their car and identifying license plates and then reporting THAT to the police (which often has the advantage of catching a lot of shoplifted merchandise). Designing customer flows so that people don't feel they can shoplift easily. Note that a lot of this falls into PREVENTION rather than APPREHENSION.

Walmart has lots of options, but no incentive to use them as long as they can pass the cost onto the police.

[dragonwriter]

Not only would they suggest it, but ISTR that there's plenty of examples (where the crime involved targeted other people on the premises, rather than business owner themselves) were knowingly making business choices that create an environment where crimes are easy and common has been found to be a source of legal responsibility of the business to the victims of the crime (with no reduction in the legal liability of the actual perpetrators.)

[brandonmenc]

> where the crime involved targeted other people on the premises

That seems to be a key difference.

[dragonwriter]

> That seems to be a key difference.

Well, its key in that people never have tort liability to themselves, so it would never come up otherwise. But, nevertheless, it illustrates that the idea that a property/business owner making conscious decisions that predictably attract crime to their premises bears some responsibility for the resulting harms is not at all foreign to our society.