New York City Is Beating the Postpandemic Shoplifting Scourge

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Earlier this month, local business leader Tom Harris picked up eyedrops at a drugstore near his office without needing an employee to retrieve them from behind a locked plexiglass barrier. In that seemingly mundane act, he glimpsed evidence of the turnaround for New York City’s shoplifting epidemic.Harris, president of the Times Square Alliance, a Manhattan business group with some 2,600 members, said he once fielded several calls a day from retailers about their problems with theft.

Now, he said, “I can’t remember the last time a retailer complained to me about out-of-control shoplifting.”The New York Police Department is making progress on tackling the scourge of retail theft that has hit businesses across the city—and the nation—in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. Retail theft is down a little over 20% in the city for the first quarter of 2026 compared with the same time last year.

Last year was also better than the one before, with retail thefts down 14% to 52,682.To help bring down thefts, the NYPD is deploying officers to subway stations that shoplifters use as escape routes from some of the most targeted retail stores. The department also has been encouraging retailers to report thefts by showing them data that doing so translates to arrests, not inaction.“I don’t care if it’s $30 worth of merchandise,” said NYPD Chief of Department Michael LiPetri.

“Call the NYPD, call 911 and make that complaint report.”The NYPD is using a data-driven approach that Jessica Tisch has promoted as police commissioner and during her previous turn corralling trash as the city’s Sanitation Department commissioner. The approach has helped the NYPD identify commercial corridors that see an uptick in