More than spirits are being lifted this holiday season.

Shoppers may be grabbing lots of things off shelves, but many are leaving stores without paying for them.

During the four weeks leading up to Christmas, an estimated $1.84 billion in merchandise will be shoplifted this year, according to The Global Retail Theft Barometer, a survey of retailers worldwide. That’s up about 6 percent from $1.7 billion during the same period last year.

“They shoplift for Christmas gifts, they steal for themselves, for their family,” said Joshua Bamfield, executive director of the Centre for Retail Research and author of the survey.

Some people always get sticky fingers during the holidays. After all, the crowded stores and harried clerks make it easier to slip a tablet computer into a purse or stuff a sweater under a coat undetected. But higher joblessness and falling wages have contributed to an even bigger rise this year, with people stealing everything from necessities (Think: food) to luxuries they can no longer afford (Think: Gucci handbag).

“It’s really a question of need versus greed,” says Joseph LaRocca, senior adviser of asset protection for the National Retail Federation trade group. “People will rationalize what they are stealing: ‘Oh, I’m feeling the economy. I lost my job.’”

Some experts say the economy’s influence is largely a cop-out. They say shoplifters are stealing for myriad reasons this holiday season that have nothing to do with economic turmoil. Among them, some do it for a rush or thrill. For others, it’s about filling a void. Still others are trying to relieve anxiety, boredom or depression — all emotions that are particularly common during the holidays.

The profile of a shoplifter may be surprising to some. Three-quarters of shoplifters are adults — equally men and women — while kids make up about 25 percent of them.

Most — more than 70 percent of shoplifters — say their crime was spontaneous.

Premeditated or not, all the stealing translates into hundreds of billions of dollars in losses for retailers each year.