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Convenience and cheapness has won. No one cares about a quality product. It's better to buy more cheap things than few good things, people think.
This is mostly evident in fashion and appliances today because we already embraced this with food decades ago.
The corporations want you to spend all your money, and money you've yet to earn, right now. Everything is bought on credit (in many cases, you can't even pay with cash anymore).
Especially in America, people want as much 'stuff' as possible for the least amount of money. What's often missing from this stuff is quality. The only way to reduce the retail price is to reduce the cost of production. This means your food is made cheaply with exploited natural resources and cheap labor. A lot of American grown food is shipped to China for processing then shipped back to the US for sale, all to meet the demands of cheaper food.
I would offer to everyone that they take some time to consider what they're buying, how frequently they buy it, and where it comes from. No government or corporation is going to change what you eat.
Start with reducing your meat consumption at every meal. Instead of a 12 ounce steak, get 10 ounces. Instead of a 5 piece chicken meal, get a three piece. Double or triple up on your vegetables.
The real changes happen when you start to cook for yourself. Just buying whole foods instead of processed foods is going to cut your grocery bill down dramatically. Compare the per pound cost of a whole chicken to boneless chicken breasts per pound. Also - have you noticed how woody and gigantic chicken breasts are now? Buy a whole chicken, butcher it, save money, eat delicious food.
Again, no one is going to do this work for you. And no one's going to force Big AG farmers to start regenerative farming. Especially given the promises of the incoming administration which may very well eliminate the USDA and EPA entirely. The new GOP is going to eliminate as many federal agencies as possible and shift them to states and corporations. The Republican Party is trying to put more responsibility in the hands of consumers. And when that doesn't work (we're too lazy to care) corporations will make the choices for us. Frankly, our consumer protections already suck so this is mostly already the case. But, as evident from this past election, more people in this country want fewer consumer protections.
This story is happening because of consumer demand and ignorance. People walking into Walmart to get groceries have no clue what's going on before they pick out their produce and protein. It blows my mind that a culture war is happening over the price of eggs being over $2. Eggs should not cost that little.
Moreover, I feel strongly that of all things a person spends their time and money on, it should be food. Food, Water, Air, and Sleep should be at the pinnacle of everyone's priorities.
Please, assess your finances and figure out how to prioritize sourcing and preparing quality food. Please find a local farmers' market. Support local businesses who put their earnings back into your community. Keep tabs on farmers who use regenerative farming and spend a portion of your food budget with them. These are the things that should matter more than a Netflix or YoutubeTV subscription.
Yes, this takes work. It takes work you're paying corporations to do for you and they're cutting corners (to put it lightly) to get you the cheapest crap permissible. Instead of asking, "why is this so expensive", we should be asking "why is this so cheap". Shifting priorities towards nourishment and away from convenience and streaming subscriptions should hopefully give you some opportunity to see things this way.
Pretending like consumer demand decided this completely shrugs responsibility of the corporations and people who made these choices.
Consumers will look at what's available and make decisions accordingly, no amount of shaming consumers will change spending habits, those will only change when their available choices do, through systemic changes.
And I'm saying that people need to consider more than just the sticker price when making choices about nourishment.
We are not slaves to corporations. Wow have the power to not purchase their products. They get away with selling shit product for inflated profit because people don't care. If you don't care, then you can't blame the corporation. That's just insane to believe a corporation is going to do something on behalf of consumers. They answer only to their stockholders.
Maybe when people stop playing the victim card we'll see some real change.
When you have to buy the cheapest things possible because that's all you can afford then that's not possible.
The 70% of Americans living paycheck to paycheck don't have that privilege.
Your argument is that 70% of Americans have no choice but to buy the cheapest things possible?
Judging by the success of companies like Amazon, Netflix, Apple, and DoorDash, that seems like an unreasonable argument.
People have more money than they like to admit. They just don't want to skimp on things they believe to necessities but are actually luxuries. Fresh food is cheaper than processed food. It's cheaper to buy ingredients to make cheeseburgers than it is to buy them at McDonalds. I buy food from the farmers market because I can't afford the grocery store. If you're truly struggling to buy food, you should register for food stamps. Every farmers market I've been to accepts them.
Shaming individuals for their finances does not fix wealth inequality.
Only systemic changes fix systemic issues
Sorry
I’m not shaming anyone and wealth inequality has nothing to do with this.
Anyone who believes the average salaried worker should be able to afford all the subscription services, a $60k car, a three bedroom home, and everything available at a grocery store is delusional. Marketing and corporate propaganda and influencers have made everyone to believe it’s your god given right to make $50k and live like the upper middle class. That’s not wealth inequality. It’s delusion.
No one has any concept of living within their means. If you make $50k; you should be shopping at farmers markets, you should have very few subscriptions (if any), you shouldn’t be buying a brand new car, you should be renting and living with a roommate to split the bills. That’s not wealth inequality. That’s personal finance 101.
You want to talk about shaming people, point your finger at social media and influencers. They make it seem like everyone should be taking on more debt to buy shit that won’t last one season. My 16 year old nephew wants a $250 hoodie he saw on TikTok. My 7 year old niece wants to do a shopping challenge she saw on YouTube. People are being manipulated to be consumers. To consume far beyond their means.
People have lost all concept of personal fiscal responsibility and what the value of things are. It’s really basic math and economics. No one wants to talk about that though. They want to play the victim card and blame everyone else because they believe “luxury” is owed to them. And then, when given the choice to put people in power to actually make these systematic changes you speak of, people explicitly vote against them.
Your entire comment consists of blaming individual spending habits for wealth inequality, and that's just not what caused wealth inequality.
If everyone is poor then there's nothing an individual can do besides organizing to fix systemic issues.
That's easy to say when you have an abundance of time...
I do have an abundance of time when it comes to meal preparation. I work ten hours a day but I wake up at 5am to prep for the day. I take half of my Sunday to walk to farmers markets and other local shops. I prioritize food because it's literally of vital importance. The weeks when I don't have time to make food; I eat poorly, I feel bad, I have a lot less money.
People used to do it. We can do it again.
What really gets me is that I would try to support businesses that made quality stuff. They either cheapened it, got bought by a larger company (who then cheapened it) or went out of business. At least with things that aren't food, secondhand is fine when I can find it.
Any business that gains a reputation for quality will immediately come under attack (yes it's an attack) from ~~vultures~~ private equity seeking to buy it up for the rep, cut as many costs as possible until the product is ruined, coast on reputation alone for as long as possible, and then when the reputation is ruined sell it for parts. Very few brands manage to actually resist this in the long term.
Sadly, you're not wrong. I've found that when it comes to food though, most small businesses stay small. You don't get into regenerative farming to get rich - you do not because you want to be the change you want to see in the world. Frankly, we need a lot more people to embrace race these sorts of values.
We had a local butcher who survived for seven years but closed their doors last year. The pandemic really hit everyone one way or another. https://share.inquirer.com/tnXDXl | https://heathermaroldthomason.substack.com/about
When it comes to other stuff, I've been going second hand or just abstaining all together from buying things. I've already got a lot of shit. A lot of it was actually really quality stuff from upstarts on Kickstarter - all of whom were out of business in a few years. We justify purchasing things we don't need because they look pretty and they "support local businesses". It's so compelling and it feels good to support humans over corporations. Maybe we really don't need more stuff to begin with.
Other times, the tried and true makers - the corporations - are the way to go. For instance, it's tempting to get a trendy new MadeIn cookware set but a used Calphalon might be a better product and last longer and doesn't generate new waste. There was a subreddit for stuff like this which I can't remember right now. There's buyitforlife but I think there was another one.