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Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

bloomberg.com

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Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#81

Post by Broken_Hippo »

z92 wrote: post #5

I don't get how food consumption can increase in a pandemic. Should be constant in or outside a pandemic situation. Possibly somewhere crops are getting rotten because of newly imposed export restrictions, or for some other things.

Food consumption changes: Pre-pandemic, a good amount of meals would be eaten out of the house. School lunches, breakfast on the way to work, lunch break at the work cafeteria or a fast food place (sure, some folks bring lunch, but many places don't offer a break room that is adequate).

All of this - and things like toilet paper - shifts to consumer goods instead of bulk goods, which takes different equipment and processing in factories, often at different times. A portion of school lunches in the US are the result of government subsidy foods: Cheeses, potatoes, and so on are very low cost to public schools.

In short: Consumer foodstuff demand has increased.

Additionally, more folks are spending a bit of time with food, changing the demands. Plus, home and slightly depressed/anxious with newly found free time means you have more time to eat - and many have taken up eating more.

And then you do have crops that couldn't be picked, disruption in shipping (food travels far), and disruptions in factories that complicates things.

Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#82

Post by nelsonmandela »

blazespin wrote: post #78
nelsonmandela wrote: post #37

Closed borders, no students/backpackers, farmers unprepared to pay minimum wages to Australians is resulting in a lot of produce being plowed back into the ground. I just don't know how this economy keeps rolling. How can farmers meet the payments on their loans? Reading 'The great depression: A diary' and looking at the world today just shocks the hell out of me. We are following it step for step and the crash is go…

"We are following it step for step". Really? Top voted comment on Hacker News? Yikes. Things have really gone downhill around here. Stick to tech, folks. "During the early 1920s, for example, prices dropped a total of 20%. And during the worst years of the Great Depression, from 1930 to 1933, prices fell a total of 25%" I mean, the title of the article was even : "Food Prices Soar Globally" If you want to be a doomer…

That was in regards to following the diary step for step - Farmers plowing food back into the fields, enactment of minimum wage laws, booming house prices followed by a massive crash with nobody attending auctions, booming stock market with massive unemployment.

Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#83

Post by octodog »

blazespin wrote: post #78
nelsonmandela wrote: post #37

Closed borders, no students/backpackers, farmers unprepared to pay minimum wages to Australians is resulting in a lot of produce being plowed back into the ground. I just don't know how this economy keeps rolling. How can farmers meet the payments on their loans? Reading 'The great depression: A diary' and looking at the world today just shocks the hell out of me. We are following it step for step and the crash is go…

"We are following it step for step". Really? Top voted comment on Hacker News? Yikes. Things have really gone downhill around here. Stick to tech, folks. "During the early 1920s, for example, prices dropped a total of 20%. And during the worst years of the Great Depression, from 1930 to 1933, prices fell a total of 25%" I mean, the title of the article was even : "Food Prices Soar Globally" If you want to be a doomer…

The snark in this comment is completely unnecessary. It is better for everyone if you make your point in a more constructive manner.

Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#84

Post by dbetteridge »

rapnie wrote: post #70
dbetteridge wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More like. I'll pay you minimum wage, but charge you exorbitant amounts for board and lodging and you have no choice because it's the middle of nowhere. Or for the extra dodgy types, cash payments below minimum wage because they know international workers are less likely to know their rights and be aware of what the minimum wage is.

The first happens in The Netherlands on large scale, since they deregulated job agencies. There are 1,000's of shady ones, where administratively all is fine and dandy, but in practice foreign labour is paid far below minimum wage + they are often threatened to not speak up, passport taken, etc. This, btw, happens all across the EU is my impression. Modern-day slavery very much alive globally even!

Sounds just like what happens in Australia, joy...

Jobseeker agencies paid by the Federal government to 'place' workers, this doesn't factor in the jobs actually being suitable or useful mind.

The workers on unemployment are also required to apply for a quota of jobs or risk losing their benefits, even though there may actually be no new jobs to apply for.

Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#85

Post by elyobo »

Glawen wrote: post #77
a_bonobo wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in Australia, some food prizes are up because the farming industry relies on cheap backpacker labor. Borders are shut so no backpackers come in, so a lot of fruit died on the field. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/02/world/australia/agricultu... It should be noted that the entire industry is notorious for doing every dodgy thing they can get away with, wage theft, rent theft, extreme conditions, so local workers…

I knew backpacking was a thing, but I thought it was quite confidential. I didn't know that the farmers heavily relied on them to harvest

Not sure that we're operating on the same definition of "backpacking" here, it's just low cost travel[1]. On certain visas in Australia you can extend the duration by working in a specified area[2], which is where that form of travel intersects with the food production issues.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backpacking_(travel) [2] https://immi.homeaffairs.gov.au/visas/getting-a-visa/visa-li...

Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#87

Post by Matheus28 »

hellbannedguy wrote: post #46

The article blames transportation cost due to Covid, and an increase in raw food prices for the rise in food cost. In my little bubble, in the Bay Area, it feels like plain old greed, and opportunity, but not price gouging. When the government tells me where I can shop, along with my fear of how certain stores have dealt with Covid precautions, my buying habits don’t take price into account like before. The first few…

If you're in California and carrying the minimum legal limits for car insurance, you're exposing yourself to a massive liability risk, especially if you're a tech worker (savings/high income), since you're not judgement-proof.

Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#88

Post by kungito »

rapnie wrote: post #70
dbetteridge wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More like. I'll pay you minimum wage, but charge you exorbitant amounts for board and lodging and you have no choice because it's the middle of nowhere. Or for the extra dodgy types, cash payments below minimum wage because they know international workers are less likely to know their rights and be aware of what the minimum wage is.

The first happens in The Netherlands on large scale, since they deregulated job agencies. There are 1,000's of shady ones, where administratively all is fine and dandy, but in practice foreign labour is paid far below minimum wage + they are often threatened to not speak up, passport taken, etc. This, btw, happens all across the EU is my impression. Modern-day slavery very much alive globally even!

I've heard first hand about this happening in Denmark on a large scale as well. It's hard not believing the government knows about this but does nothing. I wouldn't call it slavery in this case because people come by buses from Poland and go back home after the work is done. They have their freedom of movement. It's just the origin countries are so much worse than the ones where they go to work

Re: Food Prices Are Soaring Faster Than Inflation and Incomes

#90

Post by klingon78 »

Cederfjard wrote: post #52
nelsonmandela wrote: post #37

Closed borders, no students/backpackers, farmers unprepared to pay minimum wages to Australians is resulting in a lot of produce being plowed back into the ground. I just don't know how this economy keeps rolling. How can farmers meet the payments on their loans? Reading 'The great depression: A diary' and looking at the world today just shocks the hell out of me. We are following it step for step and the crash is go…

Am I interpreting this correctly that there’s a minimum wage that applies to Australians but not foreigners, and farmers thus rely on foreign labor? Edit: In Sweden we have/have had similar situations with temporary immigrants that for example pick berries for exploitative wages, but that’s because there’s no actual minimum wage per se - in the rest of society decent wages are ensured by strong unions (except in area…

I don’t mean to downplay this, but it’s similar to the migrant worker booms across the globe over past decades.

For example, people from Central America trek up at risk of their lives through dangerous drug lord territories to get to US states where they can work illegally for less than minimum wage, then send that money back to their families because they can make much more doing that than they could at home and may have no other choice.

The working and living conditions can be terrible, and answer is not to deport them or make their conditions worse; that hurts the host country as well as the workers and creates more division. Similar workers boosted the US culturally and economically because industry and governments embraced them for labor and taxes.

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