Shoplifting

Archive Report

Overview of a ’Genteel’ Crime

Cost of Shoplifting to U.S. Consumers

Have you ever taken anything from a store without paying for it? If you did, you probably did not feel like a criminal. Shoplifting is a crime, but a small one when looked at as an isolated incident. Most shoplifters steal less than $30 worth of goods at a time. But in the aggregate, shoplifting costs retail stores and taxpayers billions of dollars a year. One study called shoplifting and employee theft “the most prevalent and (aside from organized crime) most costly crimes against business and society.”1

According to the Atlanta-based National Coalition to Prevent Shoplifting, shoplifters cost Americans about $24 billion in 1980. This included the costs of security and prevention as well as the ...

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