Of Crime and Groceries

Among the many strange ideas of New York mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani is the notion that government can do a better job running grocery stores than free enterprise. This strange idea arises from the combination of the fact that some neighborhoods have inadequate or insufficient groceries combined with the ideological imperative to blame problems on approved villains, with businesses being at the top of the list.

Steven Malanga, in the City Journal, argues that the true cause is quite different:

New York City retailers have been closing shops by the hundreds in the last seven years because of growing social unrest and crime sparked by misguided criminal-justice reforms. Moreover, Mamdani’s own criminal-justice agenda, which includes reducing enforcement by the police department, promises to add to retailers’ woes.

Malanga traces the history of the fall, rise, and fall of retail outlets in New York. Not coincidentally, the pattern follows New York policy of enforcing the law or not.

There is no great mystery here. Shoplifting impacts the ability to run a financially viable retail business. Thefts destroy profits, and anti-theft measures reduce sales. If a store is not financially viable, it closes.

An annual survey of chain stores in New York has documented the closing of hundreds of locations since 2020. Every one of the 13 largest chains in the city has fewer outlets today than it did in 2019. Collectively, these operators have shuttered a shocking 797 stores in New York. Essential retailers like drug stores and supermarkets have been disappearing. Rite Aid, whose top retailing executive told analysts in 2022 that it was almost impossible to stop retail theft in New York City, has closed 73 stores. Walgreens and Duane Reade have shuttered another 128 locations. Executives blamed not only losses from theft but also sharply declining sales, thanks to security efforts like removing all merchandise from shelves and locking it in cases. Key Food, a small supermarket chain, has closed 18 stores. The city also has 45 fewer 7-Eleven outlets. Discount chains Family Dollar and Dollar General have shut 20 stores.

In New York City and nationwide, retailers have struggled to respond to waves of shoplifting prompted by revisions to laws that raised the value of goods a shoplifter must steal before getting charged with a felony, and by bail reforms that result in the quick release of those committing nonviolent crimes. In 2021, to take one example, the NYPD arrested one individual 57 times, including 46 times for shoplifting; he never went to jail. In several instances, cops arrested the man twice in the same day. “This guy comes here every day stealing, every single day,” one Walgreens store manager told the New York Post.