When I worked at Kmart, on more than one occasion they were forced to first to fire a large number of cashiers (10+) due to stealing. And the Kmart I worked in was definitely in the 'good' part of town.

Now Kmart also paid literally the minimum wage, but it still shocked me the number of people who would steal when they clearly had video, and regularly fired people for doing so. And some of the people who stole got caught for stealing bottles of soda to drink while at work...

As for stealing time, that was much more common, but I actually never saw anyone fired for that, no matter how often they took half hour long bathroom breaks, or spent an hour putting away 5 items. I guess Kmart understood they had to put up with something when paying literally as little as possible.

My comment was pure anecdote from years spent in retail (Best Buy) and co-owning a pizza restaurant. I'll update it if it helps.

A quick google finds a number of stats referencing what I'm talking about, but probably nothing scientific. Here is an example: https://losspreventionmedia.com/theft-by-employees-more-comm...

Reliable help in "low skill" jobs (although I don't believe they are low skill) can be notoriously hard to find.

I suspect that those of us who worked our ways through school at menial jobs can think of many examples right off the top of our heads.

In my experience, "1/2" is too much (depending on how you define stealing). But it was quite common for both employees to steal from their employer, and for employers to steal (wages) from the employees.

It was also quite common for employees to simply walk off when they felt they'd had enough.