Legislative Analyst’s Office Report: Retail Theft Up 11% Over a Decade

California has seen an 11% increase in reported retail theft from 2014 to 2023, according to a report released last week by the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO).

      The report, titled “Retail Theft in California: Looking Back at a Decade of Change” revealed that although rates dipped during the early COVID-19 pandemic — thanks in part to stay-at-home orders and store closures — the trend has since reversed, with a 32% spike between 2021 and 2023.

      Despite the uptick, the state’s retail theft rate remains far below the historic highs of the 1980s. But lawmakers and voters have grown increasingly concerned, which led to the introduction of a number of new laws proposing tougher penalties to curb the problem.

      “A combination of reduced consequences, fewer arrests, and evolving tactics by offenders has made retail theft more pervasive,” the LAO report found.  

      Proposition 47, passed in 2014, is cited in the report as a turning point. It reduced penalties for shoplifting and theft under $950 to misdemeanors, limiting law enforcement’s ability to arrest suspects. The report notes this shift, along with pandemic-era changes like early prison releases and reduced probation terms, likely reduced the odds of apprehension and incarceration — two key deterrents to crime.

      The report notes that retail theft declined in smaller counties during the pandemic — measured as changes during the period after 2019. However, increases were concentrated in larger counties in the state, including Los Angeles, Alameda, San Mateo and Sacramento. 

      In 2024, Californians voted to approve Proposition 36, a ballot initiative, that now allows prosecutors to aggregate smaller thefts into felony charges, and AB 2943, authored by Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur (D-Los Angeles) gives officers broader authority to arrest suspected shoplifters, even without witnessing the crime firsthand.

      “These changes are designed to close the gap in enforcement that Proposition 47 opened,” said Zbur when the law was passed. “We’re restoring balance.”

      “Ultimately, we need to ask: Do the benefits outweigh the costs?” the report concludes. “And are we reducing crime without creating new disparities?”