Targeted Retail Theft Sign Of Times?

Want more evidence of society’s disintegration? Target’s stock plunges 13% after admitting “rising crime & theft” are putting a big hurt on its profits. This ain’t just a few inner-city drugstores closing shop thanks to thievery.

How bad is it really? According to the WSJ, executives on the retailer’s recent quarterly earnings call executives blamed criminal networks for thefts and inventory shortages in their stores. In fact, they said they expected the shortages to “reduce the retailer’s gross margin by $600 million this year compared with last year.” A Target spokesman told the WSJ that retail crime incidents were up 50% in its 1,900 stores in the US from a year ago.

True, neither Walmart nor Home Depot mentioned crime in their most recent earnings reports. Yet, the paper noted most retailers concede “theft is a growing problem in US stores and that “organized crime rings have stolen billions of dollars worth of items. According to the National Retail Federation, retailers lost $94.5 billion last year because of organized theft as well as employee theft. Ironically, law-enforcement officials says Amazon’s website “is one of the biggest outlets for criminals to sell items they took from stores,” an allegation Amazon denies, adding that it works with police and retailers to hold bad actors accountable. Ok. How? When? Where?

Davd Soul