Definition of "kleptomania" []

• An obsessive impulse to steal regardless of economic need. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "I try to catch myself and wonder if I am not overreacting, but seriously, how many people, both unemployed and underemployed, the latter being the great hidden secret the family does not want to face, sort of like Uncle John's drinking problem, or Aunt Millie's kleptomania, that is spinning exponentially out of control and threatens to accelerate the misery index beyond anything we are now facing."
• "Today, reading the news, I find today's news stories have much to do with what can only be described as kleptomania by the few against the many:"
• ""Then," resumed Roger, who had evidently been pondering what Lady Bernard had previously said, "you would consider what is called kleptomania as the impulse to steal transmitted by a thief-ancestor?""