We have some Californian members here what do y'all see on the ground there? I'm on the other side of USA so I just know what I read about the place. How many and what stores have closed?
The $950 number is from San Francisco, where the mayor is currently at odds with the city council over "cleaning up" the city. The tension is that the individual neighborhoods want something other than jailing drug addicts, but aren't willing to fund it. The mayor looks bad from all the crime, and the police are between a rock and a hard place. There is a mix of individuals stealing items to resell near the store (Poverty, addictions...), and organized crime raids on high end stores by tens of individuals to overwhelm security who are stealing for resale online. (And that gets to be an interesting mix of folks, snapping up a "good deal", and active money laundering. (And just how does that person in East Dulwich come to have 10 Gucci bags anyway?))
Whether the store closures are due to shoplifting, or being low profit stores, or just plain so old that it isn't worth the cost to renovate is anyone's guess. A number of them are locations that I know were bought during the acquisition of another chain, many of which haven't been upgraded or spruced up since (2008), and they were rather dated (think '60s styling) to begin with.
Much of the pro "lock 'em up" lobbying in California is, as Gomer would say "
surprise, surprise", the prison employee unions and the jail owners. California is one of the most expensive places to incarcerate individuals, right behind New York, and multiples of what it would cost to put people in vocational school or college. Personally, I wish jail was more of a deterrent, or better at reforming folks into good citizens, but with a 43% two year recidivism rate, it has a way to go. There have been a bunch of studies on what works to reduce recidivism, but locally at any rate, we aren't doing it. E.g. California has a program to train prisoners as firefighters, but then won't let them apply to be firefighters after release as they have felony convictions. (Under an emergency waiver at the moment, they can.) Don't get me wrong; I know that there are bad apples out there for whom the right place for everyone is in a cell, but for the others, we can do better.
All the best,
Peter