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Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

nytimes.com

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Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#251

Post by PeterisP »

RandomTisk wrote: post #212
TulliusCicero wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"What is 'most cities in the US', Trebek?" But it doesn't have to be that way. I'm in Munich now, and little Bavarian towns of 10k or less are nearly always much more walkable than US cities 20x their size.

I see this point of view a lot, but it's got one major flaw: A lot of my trips to the grochery store/Costco/Sams Club include far more things than I can carry. The idea of not owning a car sounds like the exact opposite of a paradise to me.

The thing with walkability is that it changes the frequency of shopping. If going to buy food requires me to drive to a supermarket, I'm going to want to buy enough stuff to do that rarely and that will be more bags than I'd like to carry. However, as I'm usually buying food by entering one of the multiple stores that's on my way when walking home from work, I do that almost every day, and then it's just a few items.

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#252

Post by smileysteve »

scarface74 wrote: post #249
nexuist wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not having to commute hours for groceries is a big deal, as is being able to get vegetables of season - and in the rural west these things not a given. What you are describing is a de facto food desert: https://www.cdc.gov/features/FoodDeserts/index.html There might be an easy (albeit costly) way to fix this. Just today I learned about a govt agency called the Essential Air Service: > The United States Department o…

How many of these same small towns that will gladly take government subsidies scream “socialism” anytime someone mentions government provided health care, increasing the earned income tax credit, education subsidies etc?

All of the states that resisted medicare expansion are seeing their rural hospitals dwindle; so you're not far off.

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#253

Post by smileysteve »

eaandkw wrote: post #233
TulliusCicero wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and then they often blame "the system" (could either be corporations or the government, or both) for the natural outcome of living in an area without many people, which is that there are fewer useful services around, or that they're more expensive. Rural America as it is, is already heavily subsidized by urban America, but it's common for people to say that we're leaving them behind, when even as it is they're b…

I don't believe that rural Americans are any more or less dependent than urban Americans. It is just different. In a lot of places there just isn't enough population density to have everything.

Obesity statistics, proximity to healthcare - and relatedly - life expectancy, insurance coverage, taxes paid, and average job provider (for some rural towns, you'll notice the upper middle class families work in public sector (post office, government, schools, hospitals, public works)

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#254

Post by pstuart »

CharlesColeman wrote: post #86
pstuart wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not OP. It's more like they're willfully choosing to suffer. So in that case, enjoy your misery!

> Not OP. It's more like they're willfully choosing to suffer. So in that case, enjoy your misery! They're not "willfully choosing to suffer." They're actually starting co-ops but choosing not to call them by that word. The OP just decided to be needlessly judgemental over that, and lead us down into this stupid, prejudiced subthread.

> They're actually starting co-ops but choosing not to call them by that word

What are they calling them? I'm curious.

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#255

Post by smileysteve »

eaandkw wrote: post #237
TulliusCicero wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously? A huge cultural meme when it comes to Trump being elected was this idea that rural America was disaffected and disheartened because it had been 'left behind' economically. Another example, every once in a while you'll see an article or a politician talking about what a tragedy it is that broadband is more expensive/worse in rural America, and how we need to, say, support some government program to fix that…

Don't believe all of the cultural memes that you see on TV. I think the reason that the smaller population areas were dissatisfy was the outcome of globalism and off-shoring of jobs.

Your second sentence goes right along the lines of the above post; outsourcing, globalism, corporate farms, the recession -- all caused job losses in America, and for the most part (at least up to 2016) the new service, sales, and technology jobs moved to more urban locations.

Fun Fact; post 2008 recession was the first time since the depression that many food banks saw more need in suburban and rural areas than inner city.

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#256

Post by scarface74 »

smileysteve wrote: post #252
scarface74 wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many of these same small towns that will gladly take government subsidies scream “socialism” anytime someone mentions government provided health care, increasing the earned income tax credit, education subsidies etc?

All of the states that resisted medicare expansion are seeing their rural hospitals dwindle; so you're not far off.

What’s crazy, is that I would have no problem subsidizing rural America by providing access to transportation, broadband, healthy food options, etc and even farm subsidies for small farms.

But they continuously fight against programs that help other people.

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#257

Post by [deleted] »

elihu wrote: post #224
bgorman wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should we be subsidizing rural communities with free services that are terrible for the environment? If people want the benefits of modern civilization like air travel and grocery stores, they should move to cities. We are doing enough harm to the world in cities, we don't need to encourage sprawl even more.

We need to have at least some people living in small towns and sparsely populated areas to produce food and manage natural resources that cities depend on.

[deleted]

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#258

Post by stevenwoo »

eaandkw wrote: post #233
TulliusCicero wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and then they often blame "the system" (could either be corporations or the government, or both) for the natural outcome of living in an area without many people, which is that there are fewer useful services around, or that they're more expensive. Rural America as it is, is already heavily subsidized by urban America, but it's common for people to say that we're leaving them behind, when even as it is they're b…

I don't believe that rural Americans are any more or less dependent than urban Americans. It is just different. In a lot of places there just isn't enough population density to have everything.

In addition to the mentioned ESA air travel subsidy the federal government subsidizes a lot of programs for only rural citizens. https://www.usda.gov/topics/rural Along with the USPS mandate to provide service at a loss to rural Americans.

Of course this is probably result of US Senate and house giving a bit more power to states with more rural citizens in federal elections

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#259

Post by dboreham »

scarface74 wrote: post #249
nexuist wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not having to commute hours for groceries is a big deal, as is being able to get vegetables of season - and in the rural west these things not a given. What you are describing is a de facto food desert: https://www.cdc.gov/features/FoodDeserts/index.html There might be an easy (albeit costly) way to fix this. Just today I learned about a govt agency called the Essential Air Service: > The United States Department o…

How many of these same small towns that will gladly take government subsidies scream “socialism” anytime someone mentions government provided health care, increasing the earned income tax credit, education subsidies etc?

And the people screaming the loudest in my experience will turn out to derive their living from some government directly or indirectly.

Re: Farm country feeds America, but try buying groceries there

#260

Post by bluthru »

asokoloski wrote: post #54
refurb wrote: post #18

This doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Stores like Walmart and Dollar stores opened up, and consumer made the choice to shop there rather than at local grocery stores . Sounds like they are getting exactly what they wanted? Reminds me of folks in SF who bemoan the loss of a local butcher store. Sure, they may like buying organic cuts of meat at $15/lb, but it's obviously most people don't, that's why those stores we…

These stores have massive invisible subsidies in the form of tax breaks and infrastructure built to support them. That's a huge factor in how they're able to undercut local shops. The city is really footing the bill. A local butcher shop takes up a tiny amount of area, and therefore a tiny amount of infrastructure. It pays way more in taxes than Wal-Mart, compared to the amount it costs the city to support. This is a…

You're exactly right. Walmart gets gigantic tax abatements that consumers never chose.
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