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Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

theguardian.com

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Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#71

Post by ericmay »

digdugdirk wrote: post #58
ericmay wrote: post #12

Buy a bidet! I thought this was a fun tidbit: "The US accounts for more than 20% of global tissue consumption despite having only 4% of the world’s population. The average American uses 141 rolls of toilet paper per year, making them No 1 for No 2s globally, just ahead of Germans, each using an average of 134 rolls annually." I'm not sure if using a bidet would be better for the environment but maybe this is a blessi…

Yes, Canadian dairy prices were always higher than US prices, probably by 10-20 percent or so. There's an internal quota system, and a prescribed allowable volume for imports with very high tariffs on imports above that prescribed limit. Canada did this to protect its dairy industry, and to ensure there's a level of self sufficiency to their food production. Canada has the same issue in many industries, where the nee…

Got it, so really Canada has historically instituted protectionist policies to protect certain industries and ensure self-sufficiency for items deemed important to national security/national welfare and the result at least in part is consolidation into monopolistic entities in Canada.

I'm curious what options Canada has to break up these monopolies and lower prices with respect to their ongoing protectionist policies?

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#72

Post by solox3 »

pavlov wrote: post #55

Why did Republicans pick a fight with Canada? Same energy as a 13-year-old boy bullying his little brother just because of his own hormone-driven insecurity.

My guess: to weaken Canada's economy, limit Canada's international standing, bankrupt the sovereign state, cause rise of populism and voters thereof, have its people overthrow the government, then absorb the former country as a state to extract its natural resources, to fulfill manifest destiny.

Other than the current tariff narrative, it's fairly standard CIA play when we look at what they did to Latin America already.

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#73

Post by edoceo »

ForOldHack wrote: post #41
petcat wrote: post #25

Bidets need to become the norm. Canada's massive logging and mineral extraction industries have lead to significantly reduced tree-cover and (in some places) long term deforestation.

The Fraiser River Valley is one of the very most sustainable forests on the planet. The mineral extraction at Ft MacMurry has very little usable wood for lumber, and even less for paper, I believe that its a lot of manzinata that is used for OSB. I have not looked at this in a while, because my father studied forest management at UBC. Would you like for me to prove this with say 15~20 references?

Yep

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#74

Post by edoceo »

petcat wrote: post #25

Bidets need to become the norm. Canada's massive logging and mineral extraction industries have lead to significantly reduced tree-cover and (in some places) long term deforestation.

Don't users still need to dry off with paper? (I do, am I using it wrong?)

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#75

Post by kimos »

pavlov wrote: post #55

Why did Republicans pick a fight with Canada? Same energy as a 13-year-old boy bullying his little brother just because of his own hormone-driven insecurity.

Canadians may be nice but we are also petty and proud. It’s hard for us to win against a big bully, but we won’t be pushed around either.

Everyone is going to lose here.

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#76

Post by jvolkman »

edoceo wrote: post #74
petcat wrote: post #25

Bidets need to become the norm. Canada's massive logging and mineral extraction industries have lead to significantly reduced tree-cover and (in some places) long term deforestation.

Don't users still need to dry off with paper? (I do, am I using it wrong?)

Many have a fan option for drying.

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#78

Post by pfdietz »

ericmay wrote: post #33
kotaKat wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if you really wanted... buy washable toilet paper towels. https://www.marleysmonsters.com/collections/toilet-unpaper-a... As someone on the border, the tariffs do screw over individual folks on both sides of it. Canadian grocery prices are awfully high and they've been known for various price-fixing scandals (the Loblaws bread-fixing apology gift cards come to mind) so there's often a lot of Canadian Walmart/Sams…

> And if you really wanted... buy washable toilet paper towels. https://www.marleysmonsters.com/collections/toilet-unpaper-a ... I'm simultaneously surprised and not surprised that this exists (we buy washable paper towels and beeswax items and similar for reusability) but even I think that's even a bridge too far. More power to anyone who is using those products though. I've personally always found US customs easy t…

Washable cloth towels work just fine, if not in a public restroom.

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#79

Post by morsch »

larusso wrote: post #60
myrmidon wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those numbers sound insane to me. This is almost half a roll per day, for a single person? Can any average american or german person comment on how this actually works? Do you wipe like 15 times per visit, or is it just a very high amount (folded?) of sheets per wipe?

German here. What I understand is that we Germans use the folding technique instead of crumbling the paper. And we love our sweet 4 layered paper so everything is super soft down there. I can say growing up the first years of my life in the GDR with literal recycled paper as toilet paper, that I wouldn’t go back to that. But I see especially with kids etc that we overuse toilet paper. But I can only speak for my fami…

I just spent fifteen minutes to corroborate the numbers for Germany, and they appear to be a vague guess by Statista.

There don't appear to be any reliable stats or studies, which I find surprising; the few studies I could find had people use way less tp, eg https://www.radiohamburg.de/aktuelles/hamburg/Wie-scht-Hambu...

So I'm inclined to believe the 134 is hogwash; no idea if the numbers for the US are more reliable.

Re: Wiped out: US faces surging toilet paper prices amid trade war with Canada

#80

Post by HarHarVeryFunny »

pavlov wrote: post #55

Why did Republicans pick a fight with Canada? Same energy as a 13-year-old boy bullying his little brother just because of his own hormone-driven insecurity.

Trump can't win anywhere else, so he's trying for a win here.

Let's hope victory against Canada looks better than victory against Iran else we'll be paying $10/roll for toilet paper as well as $4/gal at the pump.

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