Greed causes an over abundance of theft. If there is excessive theft, it's because of excessive greed.
When people are struggling and banks are telling retailers there is excessive consumer surplus, and retailers raise prices excessively (greed), theft will inevitably increase.
If I see someone shoplifting necessities, no I didn't. If I see someone shoplifting stupid luxury items, maybe I did, maybe I didn't. Depends on the situation. If it's a dumbass white kid who thinks they're being funny, I sure as fuck did.
Even if it's a luxury good, it's all covered under general liability of retail insurance anyways. The store and the employees aren't losing any money, so the only ones facing damages are the insurance companies.
So what I'm kinda saying is: Why help those pieces of shit out? Farmers insurance is not your friend, nor any other insurance company. They'll all happily push children into homelessness and starvation if they think it can make a few bucks in the homeowners insurance market.
Now compare that to the dude who's randomly stealing shit he doesn't need. I've known a few petty thieves like that, and despite all their flaws I can pretty firmly say that they won't hurt or steal from children for any reason. Thieves are humans with (some) morals after all.
So If I had to pick a side, I'll stand by the thief knowing well and good it's the least amount of harm to be done.
And then low cost grocery stores close and neighbors starve. How about you help them pay for it since you are there? Is a little personal ownership over the things you see too much for you?
In my local community I have noticed a strong uptick, talking to store staff. But with wage insecurity and high food prices, “steal or watch your kid starve” isn’t really a decision. And yes, higher ticket items are being stolen, which some people are pointing at like there’s a difference: if the punishment is the same, why not steal the prime rib?
There have been lots of stores that claim to close locations due to looting when it’s the not the case. There is a lot of opportunistic bs happening with stores these days from price gouging to straight up shutting down certain areas for things like unionizing