The Washington Examiner reports the Walmart corporation has announced it will close its two stores located in Portland, OR. The doors close later this month. The corporate explanation:
This decision was not made lightly and was reached only after a thorough review process. We have nearly 5,000 stores across the U.S., and unfortunately, some do not meet our financial expectations. While our underlying business is strong, these specific stores haven’t performed as well as we hoped.
Bottom line: the Portland stores aren't profitable. Probable reason: shoplifting, or as the industry calls it, "shrinkage." Who will suffer? Low income city residents who don't find commuting to a suburban Walmart location easy or convenient.
I suspect chain retailers will continue withdrawing from urban locations. Especially those where the police are not encouraged to arrest those ripping off stores because Soros-funded DAs won't prosecute.
Eventually all that remains are so-called "dollar stores," bodegas and convenience stores run by immigrant families who often defend their shops at gunpoint. When the fast food franchises leave, things have gotten really nasty.
Decades ago I read a sci fi story about areas in cities where the police could not go and thought at the time it was an interesting fantasy, one I was unlikely to see exist in the U.S. It seems a lot more plausible today than it did then, and there are immigrant suburbs in France where unpoliced conditions are said to exist today.
