One in 10 young adults in UK admit shoplifting due to cost of living crisis

One in 10 young adults in Britain has admitted to stealing items from supermarket self-checkouts to cope amid the UK’s cost-of-living crisis.

Inflation has stubbornly remained in the double digits for months (the latest figure was a gruelling 10.4%), keeping food and fuel costs sky-high.

Families struggling under the burden of higher price tags have seen the cost of food rise by 19.1%; some have doubled in a year.

Imported food rose by a quarter in the last year, according to the latest data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

As the worst cost-of-living crisis in decades deepens, one in five Brits has sought out financial help to pay for food.

But there is a generational divide, with 37% of young adults seeking financial support compared with 5% of those over the age of 55.

At self-checkouts, one in 25 adults admit to intentionally missing out or incorrectly scanning goods they can't afford.

Reports have already shown how essentials like children's medicine Calpol is among the most shoplifted items in the UK. While scenes of some goods like milk and cheese having security tags on them become more and more common.

Of the 2,000 adults surveyed by the money-saving app ZipZero, 8% said they go into their overdrafts or borrow money from friends or family to cover groceries.

Some 5% polled have started to use food banks.

In the past 12 months, record numbers of food parcels were handed out by the Trussel Trust, which operates food pantries across the UK.

The charity network handed more than 3,000,000 food packages in 2022-23, a year-on-year increase of 37%.

But showing just how much the cost-of-living jump has imperilled all Brits, the Trussel Trust says one-in-five food bank users are in work.

Source: Metro UK

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