Baraka_Guru

Ah, yes, the everlasting torment of "shrinkage." The one thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is how retailers treat their employees with regard to theft/shrinkage. The usual answer, I'm assuming, is without an ounce of trust. If I'm not mistaken, the stats on shrinkage usually point to employees as the greatest cause, not customers. And so you get a situation where retail stores cannot afford to trust their employees. And so you get mandatory bag checks before you can go home after your shift.

Complain all you want about a store checking your receipt as you carry your new merchandise out the door—bearing in mind that it is, ostensibly, still only conditionally yours, assuming you wish to leave open the option of benefiting from the return policy. I've endured the humiliation of managers peering into bag at my personal belongings before being granted leave of the store. This, to keep my job. They couldn't afford to trust me, and I didn't blame them. It's just that I wasn't paid enough for that shit.

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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot