Labor Courts Condemn Stores for Being Robbed

In a new militant feat by the Labor Courts, the convenience store chain Oxxo was found liable for “exposing employees to robberies and neglecting security.” For a labor judiciary faithful to the ideological script that condemns those who create jobs, the ruling is no surprise, but it lays bare the failure of an inefficient, inert State that decided to delegate constitutional duties to private enterprise.

The decision was issued in a public civil action brought by the Public Labor Prosecutor’s Office (MPT), based on complaints about working conditions at one of the chain’s locations in Campinas. As if the two-million-reais damages award were not enough (which, incidentally, goes to public funds or projects designated by the MPT, not to the victims), the court imposed a series of obligations on Oxxo: overt nighttime security patrols, armored service windows, real-time monitoring, and medical and psychological care for the victims, among others.

No employee deserves to go through this; they are victims too. But imposing new operating costs on businesses is unacceptable for two reasons. The first is that thefts of merchandise and cash already represent an enormous loss in and of themselves. The second is that Brazil is already an unattractive country for anyone who wants to open or maintain a business: the tax, bureaucratic, and labor burden suffocates entrepreneurs.

According to Sebrae, micro and small businesses account for nearly 70% of formal jobs in retail. If, on top of the usual costs of any business, they also have to pay for private security, many will have no choice but to close their doors. This basic math seems detached from the reality of magistrates who believe they can resolve conflicts with the stroke of a pen.

The most reckless part of the ruling is the transfer of a state competence and responsibility to private enterprise. The State reserves for itself the monopoly on force and restricts civilian firearm ownership, yet it watches the robberies happen and condemns the ones who were robbed.

The ruling states: “the State’s constitutional duty of public security does not exclude the employer’s duty of workplace safety, which is a direct obligation to protect the psychophysical integrity of employees. This is not about requiring the company to replace the State in policing, but to adopt self-protection measures and work organization.”

Yet the duty of workplace safety is tied to the activity the employee performs, not to an external factor that has nothing to do with the job. A building painter receives protective equipment because the risk of falling is inherent to what he does. Extending this duty to situations beyond the employer’s control is to sanction the irresponsibility and negligence of the State.

Another profoundly audacious part of the decision is the assertion that “by opting for this business model, the company attracts the action of robbers.” In other words: since the State fails to do the basics (which, in this case, would be to strengthen visible policing), the company is also blamed for opening an establishment that attracts criminals.

By the ruling’s logic, every bakery open at dawn, every 24-hour pharmacy, and every gas station is complicit in its own robbery. The State fails, the victim pays, and the criminal remains free. Whoever holds the monopoly on force should, at the very least, answer for it. In Brazil, it is the merchant who pays the bill.