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Comment by qbasic_forever | Hacker News Reader

Why should my grocery store close because people are stealing things from it? What do I do, just starve?

...because they are losing money? stores aren't in business to feed you; they are in business to make money. Would you continue to own and run a store if it lost money for you? Better have deep pockets then.

You’re being downvoted for this, but you are right, and it’s why we have—or ought to have—a vested interest in enforcing our laws.

How does society function if no one is tasked with feeding the people?

Are we all supposed to own farms? How does that work with 330 million Americans? Who is going to have time to do things like design the hardware and software that power the devices you use to post on the internet--they don't have time to do that and work their personal farm for food...

I understand your point, that we all need to come together to solve community problems, as a community.

However, let's put this in context - when was the last time you did something, purely altruisticly, without any expectation of recompense? I think the people who do that kind of work are exceptional and exceptionally rare (assuming you are such a person). Even in those cases, those exceptional people choose problems where they can do the most good - and even if it can be argued that a community grocery store is such a place, it "competes" with various other local and global issues.

I imagine you need to get paid yourself in order to support your lifestyle.

Imagine someone were to approach you and ask the fruits of your labor for free - "qbasic_forever's software is a community good, why won't he simply do it for free?" I'm sure you have a variety of reasons, but most people's answers would be: life requires resources, so I must acquire those resources so that I and my family can live.

The grocery store owner and employees are in a similar circumstance. Or perhaps, a worse circumstance: "why should we continue to provide for a community which constantly steals from us and makes it harder for us to live?"

I have a very hard time answering this question - so I sympathize dearly with the grocery store owner.

No one is actually tasked with feeding people. We benefit from the surplus of farms which sell their excess for profit, and you are then tasked with securing the means of purchasing food if you want to eat.

Or: farms task themselves with producing food in the same way programmers task themselves with producing software.

Why should the farmers stay in business of making food if they could make more money as programmers, bitcoin traders, etc?

Why do people go into Real Estate or hospitality or teaching if they could make more money as programmers, bitcoin traders, etc?

The answer is, I don’t know why people do everything they do, but the labor market sorts itself out according to incentives, ability, compensation, laws, education, the dispersal of information and any number of factors.

We have farms and they are really good at what they do because we have food that is readily and cheaply accessible in abundance.

I mean, if the people running the store can't profitably operate (due to theft or other factors), why should they operate?

Why should the owners of that supermarket go into ruin just to give you another shopping option? Why is it their responsibility to keep you fed at all?

My grandfather owned and operated an early contemporary grocery store, growing from his fruit stand. Before self-service shopping and the checkout line, you would just give the grocer a list of what you would need and they would get it from the inventory. This also made theft impractical. Now, with the skyrocketing cost of retail rent, and other costs affiliated with retail store operations, we see a return full-service shopping with apps and food service operating out of ghost kitchens, we're finding out we don't need grocery stores.

It's a shame - however, I live in an area without this endemic shop-lifting. I enjoy my local community store and I'm sad that others in these high-crime areas cannot.

Why should firefighters put out fires? They make no money from it. It costs them money in equipment wear, water usage, etc.!

I'm sympathetic to your grandparent statement (closing stores can really screw their patrons), but the comparison to firefighters is apples to oranges. Firefighting is a civic utility-everyone contributes a little bit for the service. Grocery stores are not, in most locales.

If no one fights fires, they burn uncontrollably and we all die. If no grocery stores operate, we all starve and die. Feeding the people is the same level of protection as fighting fires.

Expenses of firefighting are paid from the state budget. When expenses of grocery stores (dispensaries?) will be paid from the state budget, the comparison would stand.

Also, shoplifting is like calling firefighters to water your lawn, because, see, it's free!

Running a store is very different from firefighting - arguably there is a much higher moral good being done by literally saving people from imminent death by burning. Firefighters are also paid in many places, even if volunteer services are available.

Finally, they do have charitable "food delivery" places - they are called soup kitchens, but they are intended for people who can't afford food at all, not necessarily for people who have the money to buy what they need.

Because they get paid to do it - they literally make money from fighting fires

How does this business of fire fighting make money? All they do is spend money on equipment, labor, etc. Where is their income coming from, and who is incentivized to keep paying them despite no profit and no return on investment ever?

It doesn't, but the community decided that it was valuable, so chose to fund it using taxes, collectively. If you make the case to your community for a communal grocery store, it too can be funded with taxes. Be warned, it comes with its own set of problems that are hard to predict at the outset.

Actually, I have private fire insurance that I do pay for, and the insurance makes plenty of money on it. That's ok with me.

People could pay for a service where firefighters would come and put out a potential fire at their house.

What if your neighbor decides not to pay their fire fighting bill? You going to be happy about living within feet of their uncontrolled blaze?

I believe those firefighting services will respond to every fire, they will just watch and prevent it from burning a neighboring house that does pay.

The average grocery store profit margin is around 2.2%. If additional shoplifting amounts to a substantial fraction of that, then there's no reason to keep the business open. Grocery stores aren't pro bono.

https://thegrocerystoreguy.com/what-is-the-profit-margin-for...

They have massive revenue, but low margins. Also large chunk of their stock are perishable, meaning that inventory control and so on is critical. It really doesn't compare to many other industries. And not to forgot how harsh the competition is too.

Really many factors bring even some losses to be unacceptable.

Because you and other people in the community aren't filling the other side of social contract. That is ensuring that store can operate without unnecessary losses from you or your community members stealing from it. It is in the end your failing of making operation possible.

Vote for DA’s and politicians that enforce the law.

Talk to your government officials to fix the underlying problem.

no please don't starve, you should start stealing food like your neighbors do.

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