[Jun8]

AFAIK, this is simply not true. If you talk to any retailer, shrink is the number one problem they mention by far, I was at NRF this January and saw this personally in my interviews with several grocery, pharmacy, and apparel retailers.

Also, when you say "manufactured moral panic", who do you think is manufacturing this? Perhaps the retailers, in order to justify the closing of their lagging stores in bad neighborhoods? If you follow the store closings you see this is not always the case, e.g. the Cotopaxi example I sited in my comment above (https://sgbonline.com/cotopaxi-closes-store-in-san-fransisco...). I can provide many other examples.

[Jaepa]

Shrink is a significant problem. I'm not saying that its not. Its especially an issue when you're already being squeezed by inflation while trying to keep prices low. And year on year numbers are up. But most individuals take on this is vibe based.

According to NRF's numbers both shrinkage & external theft are at not historically high, and are still down from pre-pandemic numbers.

There will be cases like Cotopaxi where a store goes under, but

1. The plural of anecdote is not data. 2. These types violent smash and grabs & resulting closures are not new, they are however going viral.