[theresistor]

I used to work next to a mall that literally went out of business and was torn down. The mall in my hometown has the highest vacancy rate I've ever seen.

My guess is that they are collectively dying, but that the severity of symptoms is not evenly distributed.

[flubert]

In our current "age of big data" is there a source of data that would show the number of malls as a function of time? It would also be interesting to know the trend of vacancy in malls over time, and things like average number of outlets in malls over time. Where would someone mine data like that?

[quickthrowman]

Not sure where you could get it for free, but info like this is collected by companies and sold to people who invest in malls/retail real estate.