From an article by ABC News:
Infant formula has become a commodity so hot among sophisticated theft rings that it's been called "liquid gold." The scale of the shoplifting has become so huge that it has become an interstate problem, drawn in the FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and forced chain stores to install...
abcnews.go.com
The baby food powder has become a formula for organized crime because it sells at prices ranging from $15 to $30 a can, a relatively expensive item that can give theft rings a good profit.
"The criminal groups are looking for products they can steal and they know based on market conditions, they can flip those products quickly and in a secondary market make 30 to 80 cents on the dollar depending on where they liquidate the money," LaRocca said.
Drug dealers sometimes use the powdered formula to dilute heroin and methamphetamine or to stretch the product when supplies run low.
However, experts say that more often than not, formula is stolen because of its high market demand among consumers rather than drug dealers.
In short, it's stolen because it can make the thieves who steal it a lot of money.
And AOC, the utterly ignorant, imbecilic twit that she is, thinks its because they're "doing it to survive" - not realizing the "they" are largely organized criminals. And in her inveterate stupidity, she's defending them, the thieves who are hurting the very people she thinks she's helping.
"It's much easier to frame people who steal baby formula and medicine as monsters to be jailed than acknowledge our politics and economic priorities create conditions where people steal baby formula to survive," said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).
www.commondreams.org