--they're about where they were a half century ago. That means that as a share of real percapita income food costs are less than half what they were in the '70's.
Sure, everyone hates working in the open market and prefers to wallow self-pity, but later when we get hungry and we find the free lunch place closed, we can get a job --and go fill our bellies in half the time it took our parents.
We'll still have plenty of time to blame everything on globalization --what's not to like?
The part that matters on that graph is from 2010 onwards. The price of living has risen while real wages have declined. That is the pain point for millions in this country.
It was good for ranchers till the ethanol mandates raised their feed prices. Most of that early increase was due to globalization, the later increases were due to ethanol and EPA mandates.
American ranchers were making out good till they started to be beat out due to cost, for a lot of meat now it is cheaper to import.
Look at the imports of live cattle from Australia.
So did ethanol.
I suppose this “writer” never heard of the ethanol mandate.
Stupidity on skates.
This author needs a better understanding of economics. It is entirely a political rant. To equate the consumer price of certain commodities with the effects of global trade is hogwash.
The major reason for the increase in US food prices is the unintended consequence of the ill conceived renewable fuel ethanol mandate. It has increased the price of feed for every farmer, and as a result, herd sizes of all types of livestock have been decreased, resulting in higher food prices. This is a gross oversimplification of a complex system, but it is a good basic overview.
In almost every market, it is government interference that distorts and subverts true market forces. It is an unseen tax on every activity, product, and facet of daily life. In their wildest dreams, no monarch that ever reigned would have been able to crush their producers the way we do now.
This is another reason for true conservatives to support Cruz. He gets the regulatory state, and he wants to bring it down for real. Trump has played the system his whole life, why should we think that he wants to change it.
>> ...All types and grades of beef have seen prices explode since the mid- to late-1990s.
I live in oil and cattle country. (More head of cattle in our county than there are people.)
We look at matters like oil and beef prices a little differently as a result. :-)
You can adjust the price of food for inflation but what
about income? That’s where the gap is. The cost of food
can rise right along with inflation but income always lags.
I think that that is the reason they are pushing for a higher
minimum wage as they try to inflate ourselves out of debt.
By raising the minimum wage you adjust the income at the
bottom for inflation which puts the burden and outright
theft on business and peoples retirement and any other
monetary assets.
As far as I can tell the price of beef is up because of
drought, lower than average steer weight.
