Real Time with Bill Maher

[GIGObuster]

@wolfpup

Where is “elsewhere”? Certainly not around here, where we still believe in enforcing the law.

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/several-arrested-in-sf-on-suspicion-of-shoplifting-18539713.php

San Francisco police arrested seven people on suspicion of shoplifting during a one-day operation on Tuesday at a store on Polk Street, officials said. These arrests come about a week after the San Francisco Police Department arrested 17 other individuals on suspicion of shoplifting at a downtown store on Mission Street.

Both of these busts, each conducted in a single day, are part of a larger SFPD “blitz” operation that’s aimed at cracking down on retail theft in San Francisco. The department said it will continue to conduct these one-day operations.

“referencing the persistent lack of consequences for these crimes” ?

As others showed elsewhere, a lot of what was reported was repeated and exaggerated by the media and retailers blaming other things rather than many companies leaving downtown for other reasons and retailers not wanting to acknowledge that they missed what was going on.

@Moriarty

So apparently a lot of this concern about rampant shoplifting wasn’t based on accurate information.

National Retail Federation (NRF) initially said theft results in $45 billion in annual losses for retailers, roughly half of the industry’s total of $94.5 billion in missing merchandise in 2021. But the lobbying group has since retracted the figure, saying the report from the group relied on an inaccurate figure from Ben Dugan, president of the National Coalition of Law Enforcement and Retail.

The statement that half of all missing merchandise, known in the retail industry as “shrink,” was attributable to crime was “a mistaken inference,” the NRF said in a statement to CBS MoneyWatch. It was based on a statement Dugan made in 2021 Senate testimony, the group added. It has since amended the report to make clear that Dugan was citing 2016 statistics representing total retail shrink — not the share attributable to organized theft.

Shrink also encompasses losses related to merchandise that isn’t scanned properly, vendor fraud and fraudulent product returns.

(My bold)

Lobbying group overstated how much "organized" shoplifting hurt retailers - CBS News

So, this one guy testified in front of the senate - and cites statistics from 2016 about all improperly taken merchandise, and boom, Bob’s your uncle, and the nation has a shoplifting Epidemic.