[mothballed]

It might be interesting to have some kind of "shoplifter insurance" card paired with facial recognition you have to show to enter, rather than a store-specific membership. If you steal it is an "at-fault incident" that raises your rates, but no need to deal with the legal system for the store to get the money back.

People that steal a lot would have high insurance rates and would eventually have to order all their food from one of those stores with the prison bars in front.

People that don't steal would have minimal to no insurance rates and would not be paying shrinkage for those that do.

[gus_massa]

That's nice until you get a false accusation and there is no formal procedure to appeal the ban.

[Alive-in-2025]

And this problem of no appeal possible hits you lots of places online. youtube copyright strikes (great way to attack your enemies), reddit bans, twitter bans.

YouTube bans are a killer for a lot of people who support themselves that way.

[mothballed]

There is not a store on earth I know of that will allow you to appeal the shrinkage fees if you prove you're not a thief. The costco scenario here is basically giving you an insurance discount for having ~0.2% shrinking instead of 1.4% shrinkage with the same deal that you can be kicked out with no recourse. Insurance actually would give you that 'appeal' -- lower risk groups have the chance of insuring their shrinkage for next to nothing.

All stores are basically charging you an insurance rate it's just under the current system it's baked in with the assumption you're as equally likely to be a thief as anyone else.

[gus_massa]

I prefer a hidden 1.5% secret fee instead of a possible secret permaban from all stores. It feels almos like a protection racket.

A few centuries ago, people fight to get public courts with clear rules. No we are making the courts private to save a few bucks.

[mothballed]

There's also no way to 'appeal' the shrinkage they charge you for at the store on behalf of the thieves, so still seems better to me. In either case, you can shop elsewhere (or alternatively here, seek a different insurer) if you don't agree.

That is, the insurance is the appeal. It's allowing you to appeal that you're not a thief so you shouldn't pay full shrinkage premiums. And even if you think one insurer is wrong, you can go with another one, even while shopping at the same store -- providing you more appeal options than before when previously all you could do was just leave and go somewhere else if you disagreed.

[gruez]

You can still have an arbitration system like how credit card chargebacks are handled.

[TuringNYC]

>> You can still have an arbitration system like how credit card chargebacks are handled.

You can have that, but it doesnt exist, so it isnt helpful. We can have many good things, but unless they are --paired together-- with the potentially bad things, you end up in a bad place.

Talk to anyone who has been randomly deplatformed off Uber, CitiBike, etc.