Chocolate, cinnamon, vanilla, pepper, tea, bananas, and a fuckload of other things that are completely integrated into our regular diets are almost exclusively imported.
Withdrawal is going to make people go mad
Submitted 2 days ago by Track_Shovel@slrpnk.net to [deleted]
https://slrpnk.net/pictrs/image/df27ad7b-9956-46e8-860e-85cb713228b5.jpeg
Comments
idiomaddict@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Tartas1995@discuss.tchncs.de 2 days ago
Sugar too. That ain’t healthy and is kinda fancy but… Can you see them losing their shit over sugar prices? I do.
Tomatoes imports were 2.5B in 2023.
Apparently the us imports 15% of it’s food supply.
MrVilliam@lemmy.world 2 days ago
That can’t be right. Corn can’t be only 85% of our food.
But seriously, there’s so much goddamn corn. Our meat is fed corn. Our processed foods and drinks are pumped full of corn. Even our fucking cars eat corn. We’re up to our fucking ears in ears of corn.
FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 days ago
There’s plenty of corn syrup to replace it with unfortunately.
RidderSport@feddit.org 2 days ago
Sugar is fancy now? Man my grandpa would be thrilled were he alive. There’s a colloquial term for the farm-houses of sugar beat farmers in Northern Germany, “beat castles”, as they quickly made a lot of money growing the beats in the late 19th century. When sugar became more accessible due to the processing of the beats to refined sugar. The wealth is long gone now, similarly to how salt used to be a luxury good.
vala@lemmy.world 2 days ago
And the rest is farmed here by undocumented workers.
Lemminary@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Avocados for your avocado toast. Smh.
socialpankakemix@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
not if you live in cali
TheFriar@lemm.ee 2 days ago
A lot of fruit/veg is grown in places they can get away with slave wages and then shipped here because that’s how little labor costs. Less than our already super low paid fruit/veg pickers that are primarily the people who escaped the countries and situations that put them in those even lower slave wage places.
Fedizen@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Chocolate also
ntma@lemm.ee 2 days ago
I prefer buying my coffee and chocolate directly from the child slave labour. It makes me feel connected to a past I never lived in.
udon@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I usually fly in to buy it locally. Important these days to know your farmers
BeMoreCareful@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I pictured this together in a bowl and it’s making me feel a hair nauseated
turddle@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Classic American breakfast 🤌
dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 1 day ago
The syrup helps the little corns slide down better.
Also: I can’t feel my toes but I’m sure that’s unrelated.
Skyrmir@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Coffee, tea, and everything you’re wearing right now.
kameecoding@lemmy.world 2 days ago
A ton of parts of what you are driving, all your maga hats, a ton of stuff that’s in your house
jaybone@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Your mom wears maga hats.
Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee 2 days ago
On no, but I need to buy a new buttplug every day!
Wait, I’m not American, nvm.
FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Most buttplugs can be washed. Just a money-saving tip for you there.
BigDanishGuy@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
everything you’re wearing right now
Much of that is cotton. I believe that in the “good” ol’ days the US grew that themselves. Start that industry up again, and you don’t need mass deportations across the border.
superkret@feddit.org 2 days ago
You could even run the farms the same way as in the olden days, if you criminalize and incarcarate enough black people.
ouRKaoS@lemmy.today 2 days ago
Ah, yes…
All we need to keep that industry running like the good ol’ days is a massive industry of government subsidized illegal immigration of easily identified persons
Skyrmir@lemmy.world 2 days ago
The US still makes massive amounts of cotton. That all gets exported to other countries before getting turned into garments and things.
Kalysta@lemm.ee 2 days ago
Cotton takes a LOT of water to grow. And takes up farmland that could grow food.
Most of your clothes are artificial fabrics these days. Or blended
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
Yea, and I hear children’s tiny hands are perfect for picking it.
Eiri@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
I wanted some foreign goods to get more expensive. To end slavery, not to escalate a trade war!
I should have checked my vicinity for any stray monkey’s paws when I made that wish.
AA5B@lemmy.world 2 days ago
“Fair Trade” is what you’re looking for. I don’t know how legit all instances are or whether they make a real difference, but I taps an attempt
MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
I’m not American, but tariffs to fix import issues is pretty stupid.
This is the capitalist dream, export all the production of the goods you use daily to third world countries, who will have shit labor practices like the US used to have when slavery was a thing (and bluntly, for quite a while afterwards), so that the boots-on-the-ground laborers that produce everything are either treated like slaves or literally are slaves, then import the raw material to be manufactured into whatever you’re selling in the US, so you can slap a “made in the USA” sticker on your shit to enhance sales and charge more. Meanwhile “made in the USA” doesn’t and shouldn’t imply that there’s no imported goods going into the manufacturing process to make that thing, just that you took raw materials (from wherever) and made this thing in the USA.
Tariffs unduly harm end consumers, pretty much everything we buy and own is, or has components that are, imported shit.
Most microchips, a large amount of the food we eat, most electronics, pretty much everything you’ll find at a dollar general, etc (the list is very very long)… all imported in whole or in part.
Hell, there was a time that it was more economical to have your raw materials, even if they’re mined/harvested/produced in the USA, shipped overseas for assembly by slave labor, then shipped back for sale to the US public, than to have it assembled inside the US. Much of that is still true. The US neither has the manufacturing capacity, nor the desire to build their own shit. The only time that’s not the economical option is for large cost (and scale, either in size or money) items, like housing or vehicles. Assembly generally happens in the country/landmass where the vehicle will be sold and used. Even a company like Toyota, a Japanese brand, will have assembly plants in the USA for cars sold in the USA, because that’s cheaper than importing hundreds of vehicles. For everything else, it’s generally cheaper to assemble it outside of the country and import the final product.
You think process are high now? Wait until the tariff wars really kick off.
No company is going to accept the costs of tariffs and be okay with that eating their profits, they’re passing that cost into consumers, because we’re the saps that are still going to buy it.
When the tariffs come down, and they will eventually, prices will drop, but not to where they were from before the tariffs. Companies will continue to post record profits, justifying not giving raises because tariffs, and wages will remain stagnant. We’ll earn less, while they rob is for more than they already do.
The worst part is that when the tariffs are lifted, we’ll thank them for lowering the prices by buying more of their shit. We’ll be grateful for the opportunity to pay even more into their profit margins.
Congratulations, you’re experiencing late stage capitalism. The system is working as intended. You are poor, you remain poor, barely able to scratch out a living, while your owners profit more and more off of your hard work, and you get to thank them for that opportunity.
I don’t want to live on this planet anymore.
Omgpwnies@lemmy.world 2 days ago
The worst part is that when the tariffs are lifted, we’ll thank them for lowering the prices by buying more of their shit. We’ll be grateful for the opportunity to pay even more into their profit margins.
Prices won’t go down, companies will pocket the difference
MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
Oh, they’ll go down… But it won’t be nearly as much as it went up to cover the tariff.
What I’m thinking is, let’s say a widget is $100, tariffs go in at, say 5%. So it should cost $105, but the price increases to $110. People cry bloody murder, but ultimately they “need” the widget so they buy it. Tariffs go away, yay, the price is dropped, it’s now $107.99
that’s what I’m thinking.
pinkystew@reddthat.com 2 days ago
I want everyone to be angry enough to do something about this.
How do we get everyone angry.
Sanctus@lemmy.world 2 days ago
You spew this every day for the next four years with as wide a firehose as possible. Track every tariff and price it effects, scream it into every tar pit media site out there. Literally just shove this in everyone’s faces for this entire time. Every time.
qjkxbmwvz@startrek.website 2 days ago
How do we get everyone angry.
This is the problem — taking away my coffee makes me angry, but I’ll be too tired to do anything about it.
shikitohno@lemm.ee 2 days ago
nor the desire to build their own shit
I would say that we’ve also largely lost the means to afford stuff built here, in large part as a consequence of our endless pursuit of cheap crap while scraping the bottom of the barrel with outsourcing. Even if you want to buy domestically-made goods, since we’ve lost so many of those good union jobs, especially in manufacturing, we no longer have the means to pay what it costs to make such a product with American workers. Especially if people intend to continue with their current consumerist trends.
I’m making $20/hour at the moment. If I want to buy American, union-made shoes, it’ll run me $400 a pair, on the lower end. I think it’s pretty reasonable to have a pair of work boots, a pair of regular shoes for wearing out and about, and a pair of dress shoes, which at that low end will run me 37.5% of my monthly gross pay. Now do the same for domestically produced clothing, and you’ve probably run up a bill of several month’s pay, just to have enough outfits to last you a single week, leaving aside coats, seasonal clothing, or formal attire. We’re either going to have to sharply curtail our purchasing and focus on buying a smaller amount of goods meant to last as long as possibly, or the sadly more likely scenario, we’ll see the establishment of domestic sweatshops to fuel the consumerist impulses of what remains of the middle class and up. Whether we’ll just go even more insane in our treatment of the poor here, or use prison labor and undocumented migrants “pending” deportation in these sweatshops remains to be seen, but Americans have demonstrated we shortsightedly value our ability to accumulate cheap trash over anything else.
I’d love to be proven wrong, and see a growth of strong unions and domestic production leading to a resurgence in American craftsmanship again, but the current environment is less than amenable to this outcome, to put it mildly.
MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
I don’t mean to imply the US should go back to manufacturing their own goods like they had to before global trade was economical.
I hope the point I’m making is that the people like Trump, mostly aggressive capitalists, are significantly in favor of these trends, and adding tariffs to imported goods will harm the businesses that the tariff is intended to protect.
Sales will drop because most goods are simply more price elastic than that. Cost goes up, sales drop, and overall you lose profits. When costs go up, alternative products are supposed to take up the business you lost by raising prices.
Though, to be fair, that price elasticity model is broken. Most product types have been agglutinated into a couple of large companies in an oligopoly, so all brands of that kind of product raise prices to match all the other brands. With no other competition in the market, consumers have the “choice” of paying more for the same thing, or not buying it.
In any case, the entire economy has been so thoroughly fucked by corporations that is just a money printing machine for the ultra rich to get richer.
I’ve depressed myself now. I’m gonna go.
Squorlple@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Some people have never even looked at a dang banana
remer@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Kolanaki@yiffit.net 2 days ago
Don’t they grow bananas in Hawaii?
ezterry@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
Coffee grows on Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and recently in a little bit in CA (to add to water problems)
But Labor + limited amounts means it won’t be cheaper
ziggurat@lemmy.world 2 days ago
You can grow a banana at home. Dwarf banana plants can grow inside. The normal size banana plant is not living room sized, no wonder people think they grow on trees
But how many people drink coffee? And how many bananas can you grow for your self?
Xanthobilly@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Who are we kidding? Trump’s going to enforce it selectively to nefarious ends and enrich himself off exemptions that he’s hand picked to be subservient. Free market my ass.
tempest@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
I’ve been saying this. I’m curious to see who wins out. In this case it’s populist bullshit vs American coffee retailers. Let’s see who comes out on top.
Landless2029@lemmy.world 1 day ago
100% this. I see tariffs on foreign cars coming quick.
GladiusB@lemmy.world 2 days ago
So nothing and it’s just a money grab
_stranger_@lemmy.world 1 day ago
No. Everyone who doesn’t have money for him to grab is fucked.
ericbomb@lemmy.world 1 day ago
hydrospanner@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I feel like most people I have heard talking about them while supporting Trump seem to know that tariffs are taxes, but have no concept of how they play out in a real economic situation. Most fall into one or both of two camps:
A) Tariffs are taxes, but they’re taxes for companies not individuals, and they’re only applied to importing, so they won’t affect me.
B) Tariffs are taxes for foreign companies, to level the playing field and keep American business competitive. Since the companies that have to pay it are foreign, it won’t affect me.
Spoiler alert, guys: no matter where the tax is levied in the system, the consumer is the only person who ever pays for it, since they’re the only ones that can’t pass that cost on to anyone else.
Also, while this can make domestic competitors more competitive, it’s important to remember two things: first, if it works, it’s only working by making things more expensive for consumers, and second, this assumes that the domestic competitors want more business, have the ability and posture to increase their production to meet the new greater demand, and will operate in good faith. Much more likely is that they simply also increase their prices in reaction to the tariffs, so they’re not producing or selling any more volume and aren’t creating any jobs… they’re just padding their profit margins at the corporate/shareholder level while doing nothing for their employees, all while having the average consumer foot the bill.
That’s exactly what happened with the steel tariffs in the first Trump term and that’s exactly what will happen now…the only difference is that this time it seems like there will be significantly fewer economic buffers between the tariff and the consumer, so more people will more directly feel the sting here…and presumably the mental gymnastics from the MAGAts will be even sadder in their attempts to somehow make it not a criticism of their orange leader’s incompetence.
Asafum@feddit.nl 1 day ago
Tariffs are taxes, but they’re taxes for companies not individuals, and they’re only applied to importing, so they won’t affect me.
Typical Magoo (literally my dad in 2016): “you can’t tax business owners, they’re going to just make everything more expensive for us! They pass on the burden to us!”
Also Magoo: “Yay tarrifs! They are a tax on business but that won’t get passed on to me!”
The Magoo motto: Whatever words I need to use to suit my purpose I will use, to hell with reality.
DrunkEngineer@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Liz@midwest.social 2 days ago
People listing Hawaii like they could meet the total US demand, even if they could scale to maximum production overnight.
Most of the corn we eat is Brazilian. Most of the corn we grow is feed corn for cows and process corn for HFCS and other processed food ingredients.
Johnmannesca@lemmy.world 2 days ago
As an American born and raised in Illinois I can also inform the rest of the populace our corn also gets used to make ethanol, an alternative fuel source.
Bluefalcon@discuss.tchncs.de 2 days ago
Im guessing they also never seen how much the coffee from there cost. Plus supply and demand you dumb fucks. The cost will skyrocket. Kona coffee ranges from $30 to $100 a bag. Think of a massive increase of demand. Are we going to pay $100 a bag for low end stuff?
MacNCheezus@lemmy.today 2 days ago
Hawaii does have the largest coffee growing industry in the entire US but they are severely limited by the amount of available land. Compared to other coffee-producing nations, the Big Island is microscopically tiny, so they mainly focus on high quality, artisanal product sold at extremely high prices. Not that I would mind if all the coffee sold everywhere would be replaced by Kona coffee overnight, but it just isn’t feasible.
zeppo@lemmy.world 2 days ago
It sure would help if Americans weren’t generally ignorant about uh… tons of stuff and especially anything that involves other countries. All sorts of fruits and vegetables are imported - green beans, cucumbers, squash, tomatoes, lettuce, berries, bananas, onions, cauliflower, broccoli, eggplant. And then at the same time, the Trump bros want to crack down on groups of people who make up a large portion of the domestic agricultural workforce? It’s difficult to see some conservative policies as intended to do anything other than just fuck people over and cause chaos.
100_kg_90_de_belin@feddit.it 2 days ago
They are going to blame the deep state or some marginalized group other than the one they just deported
ReCursing@lemmings.world 2 days ago
Yep. If you’re rich enough to can profit off the economy tanking
humanspiral@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
There is also seasonal trade to US even when it grows in US.
New FDA head will just change the food pyramid to Coca Cola is a vegetable.
CForsyth@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
Most competent governments think like this goose because their believe in rules based order and systems. Trump doesn’t ascribe to that view and I think he will make a sweeping change and will personally govern exceptions until it suits himself and his base. Hopefully that mangment consumes his time enough to make him less effective.
dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Rabbit hole time.
Apparently, caffeine in soft drinks is synthetic. I thought they just used caffeine that is extracted from decaffeinating coffee beans - not so. Also it’s not produced in the US (anymore), and we mostly import it from China.
Neat part is: it doesn’t look all that complicated to synthesize and requires some common-ish organic compounds and solvents to make. As a bonus, the raw synthetic stuff “the raw synthetic caffeine often glows - a bluish phosphorence”. If anyone is on his Patreon, please give NileRed a nudge to give this a shot; I think it would be right up his alley.
So we can get by without coffee, but short of running your own chemistry lab, it’s going to be a bit before industry can ramp up production of the synthetic stuff. Meanwhile, caffeinated beverages across the board would be more expensive were synthetic caffeine a part of any tariff scheme.
More here:
DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 20 hours ago
Finally, the Step Too Far.
FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I just remembered that Coca-Cola requires denatured coca leaves from South America.
So enjoy that $8 Coke can, America
milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee 1 day ago
Finally a real cure for American obesity.
BadlyTimedLuck@lemmy.world 1 day ago
All this insecurity about tariffs has me hoping he have a Boston Tea Party situation. If I recall the story correctly, they threw the expensive British Tea overboard to protest the tax.
Similarly, I also recall a sugar tax, and either an ink or paper one: basically, I hope I can see something similar to see there’s still a small piece of American values from our ancestors (not the twisted Conservative heaven MAGA wants, but on the American dream of freedom, liberty, and justice for ALL.)
No Taxation Without Representation!
Aceticon@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Well, the US turning into a banana republic will at least solve the problem for bananas.
FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 days ago
You think it’s going to be bad when people find out coffee prices are shooting up? Wait until they find out about chocolate.
shasta@lemm.ee 1 day ago
As a non-drinker of coffee, I am fully onboard with raising the price of coffee. Everyone is far too addicted to it and drink excessively to an unhealthy amount. Less coffee would be better for general health. Same for chocolate, as I saw someone else mention.
Too bad Trump doesn’t care about that and doesn’t actually have any plan in mind for this kind of economic policy for the welfare of the people.
Iheartcheese@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I will literally cry if Trump takes coffee from me
empireOfLove2@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
I’d bet they exempt it. The corporate grinder doesn’t really work without stimulants for the workers to purchase so they can work (and consume) more and sleep less.
GiantChickDicks@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
I work at a small, premium pet food manufacturer. People already complain about our prices. While most of our ingredients are sourced domestically, specialty meats are not. Lamb, duck, venison, goose, etc. going up will dramatically raise our prices.
Many of our products are chicken, pork, or beef-based, and these ingredients are sourced domestically. The fun twist is the rise in popularity of breeds and designer mixes that are predisposed to ingredient sensitivities or allergies. Many of these breeders advise against chicken or beef in these dogs’ foods.
You’d think people spending 3-9 thousand dollars on puppies would be in a position to afford special diets, but my experience says otherwise. It’s about to get a lot worse.
We’re lucky, in that we’re one of the few brands who utilizes mostly domestically sourced ingredients. I would expect pet food to jump generally, which doesn’t bode well for the increased pressure shelters and rescues are already facing.
Moah@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
No more avocado toast
Pacattack57@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Not sure if nafta is still active but I don’t think we can tariff Mexico. Mexico has some good coffee options
Kalysta@lemm.ee 2 days ago
It would be interesting to see the first bipartisan riot.
HowManyNimons@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Gonna be some cranky leopards in America.
smokebuddy@lemmy.today 2 days ago
No more coffee but plenty of PRIME™ for all!
That_Devil_Girl@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
A LOT of food sold in the US are imported.
proton_lynx@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Hahaha, shame on you. I live in a country where we make the coffee and we still pay taxes for it.
WoodScientist@lemmy.world 1 day ago
In our techo utopian future, the only caffeinated beverage will be Diet Mt. Dew.
lung@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Hawaii for one
bitchkat@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Apparently, farmers buy a lot of fertilizer from China.
rational_lib@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Politically-motivated tea tax, what could go wrong?
nicknonya@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
what would the boston tea party equivalent for america be? dumping an entire mcdonalds worth in the sewers?
jaybone@lemmy.world 2 days ago
The Boston tea party was the American equivalent of the Boston tea party.
_stranger_@lemmy.world 2 days ago
That’s just eating at McDonald’s with … less steps.
rockSlayer@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Nationalizing energy infrastructure
riodoro1@lemmy.world 2 days ago
They wouldn’t handle it.
Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee 2 days ago
Tbh thats just one step less than how it normally works.
milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee 1 day ago
“No tariffs without Harris”