Here in Australia our two major chains just convinced the police to station publicly-funded officers in the checkout area: http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/home/crackdown-of-self-serv...

Cut staff numbers without having to pay for increased security! That's just good business sense.

I guess it depends on how you set them up. In the UK you'll find self-checkout scanners in nearly every supermarket that contain scales. Stealing with those isn't easier than just stealing in the first way. You can't just "forget" to scan an item.

Scanning while you shop, however, doesn't really seem to work. Tesco tried that and basically stopped it again. You either need to check really often (high staff costs) or will have losses.

Oh. I assumed Albertson's dropped these because they were slow and inefficient, not because of loss/shoplifting. The stories I can find about it suggest the same.