To wonder why shoplifters are so thick and selfish?

I have shoplifted. One baking potato and 2 bananas. This was nearly 30 years ago. I was broke. All I had at home was half a block of cheese and some butter. Wasn't getting paid for another two days. So yes, I pinched something to eat. After having eaten plain pasta with grated cheese for the previous three days, those bananas tasted fantastic.

Thank you, finally someone applying reasonable thinking to this thread

Some of the comments, so sad

Whenever shoplifting is discussed, there are always comments about poor single mother, starving with no options. The real problem with shoplifting, are the gangs that strip a whole rail of clothes, or a display of steaks, then intimidate and threaten any member of staff trying to stop them. I worked in high street retail for 30 years till 2018, and the gangs controlling shoplifters and beggers worsened every year. If you haven't worked in retail you have no idea what staff have to face on a daily basis

I don't disagree with you that some people see crime as easier than work, but I read @WaryCrow 's post to be about the societal conditions that create a black market, rather than individual sellers. Criminals fencing stolen goods are opportunistic - they see what the market needs and they deliver. If people are buying stolen meat, baby formula, medicine etc., then the answer is to look at why they are doing that rather than buying from a shop (e.g. poverty, access etc) and solve those issues.

Do you own a pharmacy that has a shoplifting problem, OP? Is that why you're so rude towards posters like @mumofoneAloneandwell and brush over lived experience? Whilst some stats suggest that it's likely shoplifting is often driven by organised gangs, there will always be some who shoplift out of a genuine need.

There's an interesting article on the myths vs reality of shoplifting in the UK here:

https://policinginsight.com/feature/analysis/whats-the-truth-behind-the-shoplifting-epidemic-six-key-questions-answered/

Are the pharmacies you are referring to using all of the measures available to help prevent theft? Because that, and lobbying the Gov to use a combination of carrot and stick approaches to encourage private organisations to put in place strategies that can help reduce shoplifting (and address the massive poverty issue) is the only thing that is going to bring about change.

See also paying tradesmen in cash for a discount. Tax evasion costs all of us

Someone ran into my local wetherspoons kitchen recently, grabbed a load of packaged steaks and ran out again.
A lot of shoplifters are addicts. They need money to feed it and it is the only way they can get it. Then you have those who steal to order and/or to sell. Id say a very small minority are the ones who are on the bones of their arse needing to feed a baby etc.

At 7pm? All you need is calpol to sort the fever

You could either spend hours in a&e for some calpol or solve the issue by taking some from tesco

I couldn't judge a woman for that

NO it really isn't. Most people doing that are doing it because they can, not because they're financially desperate. Look at those illegally selling duty free cigarettes and booze - most of the people buying have jobs and could afford to buy it in the shops, they just don't want to and get a buzz from buying it on the cheap, in the same way people like to buy counterfeit/fake perfumes, DVDs etc from car boot sales. They're the same people getting a buzz from tax evasion and benefit fraud by "getting one over on the man" or other stupid concepts!

Surely in this situation if you couldn't afford Calpol you'd take them to the GP or walk-in centre and all them to provide some Calpol

Really? Steak and expensive laundry pods.
Because it’s the expensive stuff that gets stolen.
Maybe they need to buy cheaper laundry detergent and buy mince.

Well, some people can only afford to buy meat and laundry stuff from Pete behind the Wetherspoons. That’s the truth of it.

Not necessarily.

I'm in London.
To be honest the scheme might not exist anymore. I'm not sure. My daughter is 17 now and I know it was around about a decade ago.
Edit :
Apparently it comes under the NHS Minor Ailments Scheme and you can still get it if the pharmacist thinks your child needs it.

There are no consequences for stealing.
Once upon a time, there was a punishment including prison time.
These days, no prison space for medium/low crime, especially not for stealing

@WaryCrow

If you don’t want the black market to exist then we need to find better economic solutions in a time when there are not and never have been enough jobs, wages pay nothing like the cost of living, and essential education or training costs money we do not have, other than denial that this is happening.

Lots of people "working" in the black economy etc are certainly not on the bones of their arses and many are relatively well off. Many "could" work proper jobs (or self employment) and pay the right taxes, abide by the laws, etc if they wanted to, but they want "something for nothing", so evade tax, defraud benefits, steal, sell stolen/duty free/counterfeit goods, etc.

Methadone is the cheapest sticking plaster for a lifetime of addiction. There are much better drug treatment programmes out there but the government won't properly fund it.

And we can blame addicts for picking up the drug in the first place and not having the strength of character to say no. But addiction is an illness and should be treated like any other illness. It's also an illness that has a huge cost for communities in the form of crime, anti-social behaviour and safeguarding.

I blame the people who buy the cheap meat and laundry pods.

Lots of drug addicts etc won’t engage with therapy. I know some who have been to rehab and therapy and are on methadone. Still prefer to take any drugs they can get.
I also know a couple of alcoholics who steal alcohol.
The few I know got in with a bad crowd at school and never left. And they are in their late forties!

Because drugs like heroin and crack are very expensive. Users can end up needing to "earn" hundreds of pounds a day to just feed a fairly average drug habit.

Dealers can charge whatever they like - they are able to bring drugs into the country relatively easily, cut and distribute on to the streets via vulnerable young people to desperate addicts who need to use in order to function.

If people had easy access to medically approved alternatives and proper long term therapy, they would not need to feed their habits through theft, burglary, prostitution etc

But drug users don't get this because it's a criminal justice "problem" and the nhs can't fund decent drug treatment.

I don't think we should turn a blind eye to crime but I do think that the resources to address the actual problems are misdirected.

Selfish, yes but I don't know about thick. There are pretty much no consequences for shoplifting aside perhaps from getting banned from a store which they will pretty much ignore I imagine, given that trespass isn't even a crime.

I work in a pharmacy in England and this isn’t true in the region I’m in. Whereabouts are you?

Absolutely right. It’s just awful but people who don’t have any experience of them just don’t understand and immediately pull the racism card