America is Choking Under an 'Everything Shortage' (theatlantic.com) 575
The global supply chain is slowing down at the very moment when Americans are demanding that it go into overdrive. The Atlantic: Is it just me, or does it feel like America is running out of everything? I visited CVS last week to pick up some at-home COVID-19 tests. They'd been sold out for a week, an employee told me. So I asked about paper towels. "We're out of those too," he said. "Try Walgreens." I drove to a Walgreens that had paper towels. But when I asked a pharmacist to fill some very common prescriptions, he told me the store had run out. "Try the Target up the road," he suggested. Target's pharmacy had the meds, but its front area was alarmingly barren, like the canned-food section of a grocery store one hour before a hurricane makes landfall.
This is the economy now. One-hour errands are now multi-hour odysseys. Next-day deliveries are becoming day-after-next deliveries. That car part you need? It'll take an extra week, sorry. The book you were looking for? Come back in November. The baby crib you bought? Make it December. Eyeing a new home-improvement job that requires several construction workers? Haha, pray for 2022. The U.S. economy isn't yet experiencing a downturn akin to the 1970s period of stagflation. This is something different, and quite strange. Americans are settling into a new phase of the pandemic economy, in which GDP is growing but we're also suffering from a dearth of a shocking array of things -- test kits, car parts, semiconductors, ships, shipping containers, workers. This is the Everything Shortage. The Everything Shortage is not the result of one big bottleneck in, say, Vietnamese factories or the American trucking industry. We are running low on supplies of all kinds due to a veritable hydra of bottlenecks.
This is the economy now. One-hour errands are now multi-hour odysseys. Next-day deliveries are becoming day-after-next deliveries. That car part you need? It'll take an extra week, sorry. The book you were looking for? Come back in November. The baby crib you bought? Make it December. Eyeing a new home-improvement job that requires several construction workers? Haha, pray for 2022. The U.S. economy isn't yet experiencing a downturn akin to the 1970s period of stagflation. This is something different, and quite strange. Americans are settling into a new phase of the pandemic economy, in which GDP is growing but we're also suffering from a dearth of a shocking array of things -- test kits, car parts, semiconductors, ships, shipping containers, workers. This is the Everything Shortage. The Everything Shortage is not the result of one big bottleneck in, say, Vietnamese factories or the American trucking industry. We are running low on supplies of all kinds due to a veritable hydra of bottlenecks.
lockdowns ftw (Score:3, Insightful)
wtf did you think would happen when you shut things down repeatedly for a year and a half.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Republicans don't even bother pretending anymore. Now it's automatically do the opposite of whatever democrats are doing. Take this for example:
https://www.texastribune.org/2... [texastribune.org]
Why does governor Abbott hate business? The party of personal responsibility, hands off government, and favoring capitalism is now suddenly all about what private businesses are allowed to do.
Same with Florida. Schools funded by public money want to mandate masks? Oh no you aren't allowed to do that. You must do exactly as I say.
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Now it's automatically do the opposite of whatever democrats are doing.
Well, I'm British and I take very little interest in US politics - but that does look like a sensible idea. From what I've heard about what some prominent Democrats say and do.
The most basic rule of sanity is to respect reality. As Philip K. Dick said, "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away".
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Which civil liberty is being violated by private businesses requiring a vaccine?
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Thats laughable. They are hardly pro individual liberties.. if they were, they'd be pro BLM, less pro-police.. and god forbid people who are transgender or not straight run a business.. "That's against god and they need to be shut down!"
So don't give me that BS.
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Thats laughable. They are hardly pro individual liberties.. if they were, they'd be pro BLM, less pro-police.. and god forbid people who are transgender or not straight run a business.. "That's against god and they need to be shut down!"
So don't give me that BS.
This is all complete nonsense
Individual liberties are not incompatible with being pro law and order.
Investing in a business only happens where there is protection from mobs and crime.
BLM's positions are anti-capitalist and pro anarchist. But the founders sure love being rich capitalists.
Show me examples of policies that squash a business based on sexuality of the owner.
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BLM's positions are anti-capitalist and pro anarchist. But the founders sure love being rich capitalists.
There are supporters of BLM, or more likely opportunists, who promote those views. From my point of view, as an old white bloke, I think the general idea behind BLM is very worthwhile. You imply that the founders of BLM are making big dollars. Have you got any evidence of that?
Here you go. You can easily find other references online
https://exactnetworth.com/patr... [exactnetworth.com]
Patrisse Khan Cullors Net Worth & Career
Cullors founded the decentralized political and social movement called “Black Lives Matter” in 2013, along with friends Opal Tometi, Alicia Garza, and some community organizers
Patrisse Khan Cullors has amassed a total net worth of $2 million by 2021. Most recently, she is suspected to be misusing the funds that were raised from the Black Lives Matter movement as s
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Thank you for that information. What I think is unfortunate is that a good cause could be corrupted by people making money out of its popularity. I get particularly irritated by TV evangelists, who claim to follow the teachings of Jesus, while creaming millions from their followers.
My basic point is that the moral point of BLM should not be discredited by a minority of people who are exploiting the movement for personal gain.
Re: (Score:3)
Thank you for that information. What I think is unfortunate is that a good cause could be corrupted by people making money out of its popularity. I get particularly irritated by TV evangelists, who claim to follow the teachings of Jesus, while creaming millions from their followers.
My basic point is that the moral point of BLM should not be discredited by a minority of people who are exploiting the movement for personal gain.
I think Black Lives Matter is a persuasive political slogan and organization that cares little about black lives.
If they thought black lives mattered they would be out there trying to improve them, like by doing something about the extremely high black on black murder rate. But you can't raise money trying to address that. The money is in blaming cops and capitalism for everything. I detest bully cops who abuse their authority and think police who demonstrate a lack of judgement or temperament for the jo
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First of all, you claim to know an awful lot about what other people believe and want - even though you make it very clear that those are people whom you despise.
Second, perhaps some of those broad political views may have something to do with people's different experiences of life.
"There is no one more Liberal than a Republican who's been indicted, and no one more Conservative than a Democrat who's been mugged".
- Hubert Santos, CT Criminal Defense Lawyer http://articles.courant.com/20... [courant.com]
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Insightful)
Being unvaccinated is not a protected class. Texas is at "at will" employment state. An actual republican would say if you don't like the companies policies then you are free to find employment elsewhere.
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Insightful)
Nice straw man arguments.
We are talking vaccinations here. If you want to argue that there shouldn't be Covid vaccine requirements then you should also be out there arguing that we should be doing away with vaccine requirements for other diseases. Fight against small pox vaccines, chicken pox, measles and rubella (etc.). Vaccination mandates have been around for decades before Covid and there will be more vaccine mandates for centuries to come.
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Insightful)
He doesn't hate business. He hates mandating people do shit to their own body.
Oh. Like women and abortions, huh?
Re:DAAAAMN (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:DAAAAMN (Score:5, Informative)
So anti-vaxers agree to stay home and not go into public places without an N95? And agree to forgo medical care when they get Covid?
Because you are not free from the consequences of your irresponsible behavior.
It's funny because you think they have access (Score:3)
Also, I'm not pro-choice, I'm pro-legalization. If you think it's murder, you're going to treat every miscarriage as a potential murder. This has 2 consequences:
1. Every natural miscarriage is a potential murder, meaning women who miscarry can't get necessary medical treatment because every doctor's office is terrified of being an accessory to murder.
2. Every miscarriage must be investigated and prosecuted as an alleged murder
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Freedom of choice is not about freedom of consequences - you free to choose to not let some stick their dick into you; you had the freedom to use birth control and the freedom to insist he use a condom as well between those two things your chance of pregnancy is darn close to 0.
You do realize that some women/girls end up in situations where they're denied all three of those freedoms, right?
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:4, Informative)
Doesn't seem to stop Texas from mandating other vaccinations:
https://dshs.texas.gov/immuniz... [texas.gov]
https://dshs.texas.gov/immuniz... [texas.gov]
https://dshs.texas.gov/immuniz... [texas.gov]
As the parent poster said this is more about politics than public good.
Re: (Score:3)
Every single vaccine ever created has side effects for a small portion of the population (yes even covid vaccine side effects are quite rare)*.
There has yet to be a single vaccine that is 100% effective over the entire population.
The covid vaccine does prevent infections. Just because it isn't 100% effective doesn't make it any less effective than a myriad of other vaccines.
*If you can provide official documentation for these claims (i.e. not a Facebook post) feel free to post them. I can counter your claim
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Insightful)
He doesn't hate business. He hates mandating people do shit to their own body.
Why hasn't Abbott revoked the school vaccine requirements [texas.gov] for Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Polio, Measles, Mumps, Rubella, and Hepatitis B?
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Informative)
Not only that, those diseases are a lot worse than a flu or a cold
In a bad year, Measles killed about 30,000 people. COVID killed 650,000.
Stop lying. You are literally killing people.
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Interesting)
Republicans are pro individual liberties
LOL, like drugs, prostitution, euthanasia, pornography, etc?
Nobody cares as much about what you do with your own body as Republicans.
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So Texas governor Abbott is also a "fascist authoritarian" since he hasn't rescinded the mandate that children must be vaccinated for a whole host of other diseases before they can attend school (e.g. measles, chicken pox and rubella).
If you want to live in a society you must be willing to suspend some of your civil liberties so that others can also exist in that society.
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The linked article clearly states that they're banning private businesses from having their own vaccine mandates.
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Supply problems have comparatively little to with US. In fact, both US and EU areas have been largely able to deliver the industrial outputs even with some lockdowns that they had. Problem is that almost everyone outside, had and keep having actually crippling lockdowns. And supply chains are global at the moment and much of industry works on very tight tolerance JIT manufacturing model that easily chokes on even a single input lagging behind.
And right now, a lot of inputs lag horribly, because a mine, a fa
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Informative)
"Two months of everyone getting mandatory vaccines, with teachers, first responders, nursing staff, and others likely to spread the disease put higher in the queue" which was possible early this year, we wouldn't be in this situation.
I happen to be in the Netherlands at the moment (on a business trip), and I'm finding it really nice. No one is wearing masks, anywhere, and what social distancing remains feels more like acquired habit, rather than anything being recommended/required. Everything is fully open, all services are available. I'm sure shortages are an issue, of course, because that's a global issue.
What makes this normalcy possible is very simple: To go to any restaurant, bar, movie, office, sporting event, or any other place where people gather indoors outside of the home, you have to be able to prove that you are either fully vaccinated or have had a negative COVID test in the last 24 hours. The mechanism to prove that is digital and pretty streamlined, so in practice it really isn't a bother. The result is that life is nearly indistinguishable from pre-COVID times. It's really nice.
Re: lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Insightful)
Why wear a parachute? They occasionally fail to open.
Why take a vaccine? Even though they massively the risk of severe covid illness, hospitalisation or death, the vaccine occasional fails to protect (say 5% of time).
My god you are stupid as fuck. Jesus sideways-fucking Christ.
Re:lockdowns ftw (Score:5, Informative)
Can't blame it all on Covid shut down
Global supply chains face months of disruption from Texas storm [ft.com]
Texas Freeze Triggers Global Plastics Shortage [wsj.com]
Texas freeze shuts chip factories amid shortages [bbc.com]
Outages help reveal value of Texas petrochemical industry [houstonchronicle.com]
Hurricane Ida aftermath will worsen supply chain bottlenecks and lead to even more shortages and price hikes, experts warn [businessinsider.com]
U.S. farmers face supply shortages, higher costs after Hurricane Ida [reuters.com]
We based our entire supply chain on China (Score:5, Insightful)
We also used computers to determine the bare minimum amount of slack we needed in our supply chain in order to maximize profit, and we slashed gov't involvement in our supply chain in the name of "the free market" (read: short term profits and tax cuts for the top).
This is what happens when nobody's overseeing the supply chains. We don't do this with our food supply, the gov't is heavily involved there (we just don't like to talk about it). That's the only reason you're not starving right now.
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tl;dr: Markets don't preclude tragedy of the commons.
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It's not just China. This is world wide. They're having lockdowns everywhere from Brazil to Thailand to Austrlia. China has to import a lot of raw materials and processed inputs from abroad for its supply chains.
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That's not because of any Chinese supply chain.
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Productivity is a conserved quantity. That is, supply and consumption have to be equal. In order for you to buy a TV, someone has to first make a TV. And the number of new TVs bought can never exceed the number of new TVs produced.
This is the flaw with trying to spur on the economy (smooth dips like the COVID-induced 2020) via stimulus checks and low/no-interest loans. Yes you're helping to maintain demand
Re:We based our entire supply chain on China (Score:5, Insightful)
And yes, the virus did originate from Wuhan research lab and it's not natural.
And so? Even if this is true (which only the right-wing in our country seem to believe), how does knowing this, publicizing this, or punishing this help with the current supply chain issues? I wish I had mod points so I could mod you Off-topic. That won't stop you from riding your hobby horse, but it might spare others the time waste of reading your verbal spew.
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it's only a pure coincidence that the disease outbreak started three city blocks from the Wuhan virology institute
So you think they just set up a dartboard on a map of China to pick their location for a Virology research institute? They put it there specifically because of proximity to various specimens.
When you have a shortage that creates a shortage (Score:3)
Shortage of longshoremen?
Shortage of people to unload the cargo ships.
Shortage of cargo?
Delays in getting anything shipped from other countries.
Shortage of getting things shipped?
While not critical, slow down manufacturing, sales in brick and mortar and online sales.
Shortage of workers (because nobody wants to do the shit jobs for minimum wage)?
Stores/restaurants close, nobody to stock shelves, mop the floor, run cash registers.
It certainly seems as if not a death spiral, someone has flushed the global economy toilet, and the water is starting to circle.
Re:When you have a shortage that creates a shortag (Score:5, Informative)
A west coast stevedore makes a six figure salary. Long haul truck drivers make $80k+. This isn't an "underpaid workforce" issue.
However, when the west coast stevedores went on strike twenty years ago, one of their demands was that the ports would not be able to implement automation, because that would mean less jobs for stevedores. That does have a direct impact
I know several long haul truckers (Score:3, Informative)
Hype (Score:5, Interesting)
I just don't see it. I keep reading article after article about this but its not the reality at any of the grocery stores, drug stores, dollar stores, home stores etc in my area.
There are a few obviously in demand items like COVID test kits, PS5s, and Nintendo products that 'hot' right now you can't get but reports of canned soup, paper towels, TP, and sour patch kids being hard to come by seem greatly exaggerated. This is rural becoming ex-urb area population about 25k. Maybe my expectations are different maybe more of the problem exists at the nearer-to-consumer deliver end and is impacting more densely populated areas more; I don't know.
I also realize the problem is real, however it sure seems like a lot of this is a 24-hour news media - lets find a reason to panic - more than any sort of crisis.
Re:Hype (Score:5, Informative)
For me it's weird items... I ordered a screen door back in March and it still hasn't arrived. At the grocery store, whipped cream cheese is out, regular is still there but I prefer the whipped kind. The battery in my car died, had to get an aftermarket one since the dealer had no stock. Top Ramen is constantly missing.
So it's not anything major and I can get by, but it's really kinda weird. It makes sense that it's a failure on so many levels, sure it doesn't drastically impact me right now but I can imagine that if my meds were in one of those containers then I'd be freaking out right now. Luckily for me, it's just cream cheese.
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Most of the empty shelve-problems here are due to the storage/delivery just-in-time algorithms screwing up, because of the hoarding of stuff last year. Somehow they haven't been fixed yet for some products, like garbage bags and some brands of soft drinks.
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You really haven't been in a Target lately. They do indeed have plenty of bare shelves.
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Target always has empty shelves. I tried shopping at the "flagship" store in Target's corporate HQ hometown (which is actually located in its most upscale suburb) and it was always an exercise in futility, and this was before the pandemic.
This store was constant out of stock in many aisles. It made no logical sense. The grocery store side was impossible, they sometimes ran out of whole milk!
I did some contract work for a Target business partner and they just laughed and said Target's logistics were awful
Re:Hype (Score:4, Informative)
It's a real issue its just not as dire as they report.
Every restaurant I've been to the drive through of recently has a sign that they're out of certain items, or they'll tell you when you drive up. Granted, they're not out of FOOD - they just might not have exactly what you're looking for. IE, I order chicken strips at Popeyes the other day and they were out of spicy strips - mild only. I ordered a sausage biscuit for breakfast at BK the other morning - no biscuits, but they can sub a sausage croissant.
There's a Chevy dealership about a mile from my house - it's a big lot, about 14 acres. They literally have about 20 cars for sale right now.
Nothing ground breaking, but its definitely noticeable that everybody is a little short on goods right now.
Oh and because in times of uncertainly people tend to feel a little uneasy and turn into "preppers", it's damned near impossible to find ammunition right now.
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Re:Hype (Score:4, Informative)
Of course there are shortages or delivery delays in some areas or for some products. However there are plenty of areas in the US that have _no_ visible grocery shortages, food shortages at restaurants, prescription drug shortages, or anything of the kind right now. Empty shelves were something that happened last year, and not for long.
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Things like auto and small truck parts are in seriously short supply right now. I took my truck into the dealership in early August for a warranty repair. It took them ~7 weeks to get the parts in.
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I also realize the problem is real, however it sure seems like a lot of this is a 24-hour news media - lets find a reason to panic - more than any sort of crisis.
While I agree there is likely exaggeration, there are some things completely gone. Purina Friskies canned cat food is almost completely empty in every store in my part of a fairly large city. There is some gravy varieties that can be found on the shelf at times but paste variety isn't there. This wouldn't be a major issue but our cat refuses to eat much of anything other than Friskies paste cat food (she will hardly at all eat any with gravy). Sure there are other varieties but we have a cat that is bet
I have read that local shortages are a problem (Score:4, Informative)
But the author is extrapolating from a very limited set of his own personal experiences. He describes a grand total of three things and two local pharmacies. That doesn't give me any incentive to read his article - maybe at some point he actually talked to someone authoritative rather that the hand-waving crap that was used for the summary.
Anyway, other than very early in the pandemic - when the issue was hoarders, not the supply chain itself - I haven't had any trouble finding paper towels, toilet paper, or other paper products. And I've never had any trouble with my prescription medicines. Prices for some things are higher, which makes sense given the increased costs being added to the supply and delivery chains thanks to COVID-19.
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What Truckers Say (Score:5, Informative)
A lot of people are complaining about just-in-time production. However, a benefit of JIT is bottlenecks are easy to find. The problem appears to be at the ports. [cnbc.com]
consequences of morons being in charge (Score:2)
that's what you get when there are no more locally produced things, and everything is imported from south-east asia...
Bring manufacturing back home (Score:3)
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From a peacetime perspective that's not as big of an issue, but it does worry me that we've outsource the majority of our manufacturing to the very country that we're most likely to be involved in a large scale military conflict.
Granted, we still have a decent amount of domestic production capacity for certain military items (eg, guns, ammo, vehicles), but it's pretty much guaranteed that if we ever went to war with China the shelves would almost immediately run empty of regular consumer goods.
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... if we ever went to war with China the shelves would almost immediately run empty of regular consumer goods.
If we ever went to war with China, I think the fallout from the nukes would be your main worry.
Poor Just In Time management (Score:5, Insightful)
The japanese business strategy of Just In Time (JIT) delivery has been poorly implemented outside of Toyota that invented it. Basically Toyota did NOT use JIT for all their inventory, it was only used for products that were a) Expensive or Large (taking up either cash or inventory space), b) easily available, and c) source-able nearby (Japan or at most, China).
American car companies used it for computer chips (small and cheap) that were manufactured across the largest ocean in the world (China).
That is not JIT, it is workable-as-long-as-nothing-goes-wrong.
Then something went wrong.
Outsource everything and print stimulus money. (Score:3)
Hey but toilet paper is in stock, it seems everyone has plenty of that!
Offshore for the win (Score:2)
This is what happens when a country becomes dependent on Asia and developing markets for almost everything.
Mix that with a labour shortage of people not willing to work for peanuts anymore and you have this situation.
Caused by generations of "not in my backyard" and "I want it cheaper" mentality
Whoa. (Score:2)
"That car part you need? It'll take an extra week, sorry."
IT'S THE END OF THE WORLD.
Yet landfills are full (Score:2)
Yet the landfills are full. Maybe we shouldn't make everything disposable and substituting buying goods and services for things that don't need supply chains, like spending time with family, sports, cooking, gardening, and things people have done forever.
Only in the US??? (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe I'm oblivious, but - here in mainland Europe - I have heard almost nothing of logistics problems (the UK has...other problems). Sure, the chip shortage is global, but that's a production problem. The logistics problems seem to be US specific.
Why should that be the case? And if it really is the case - as opposed to some stupid game being played - there's a lot of money to be made by fixing it, so: why hasn't that happened?
We can recycle ... (Score:5, Funny)
... old Soviet jokes:
A man walks into a shop. He asks the clerk, “You don’t have any meat?” The clerk says, “No, here we don’t have any fish. The shop that doesn’t have any meat is across the street.”
The teaching moment: why can't we make more? (Score:4, Insightful)
I was struck by the author's plea near the end of the article:
That's a simple and deep question at the same time. Why can't we? Clearly, we could. I'm sure Elon Musk and team could spin up a container factory in three months.
The deep part is realizing we don't because we'd prefer Musk keep working on making more Teslas. Every day his team spends making containers is one day they're not building a second Gigafactory. And more generally, if we make more containers, semiconductors, hair dryers, and all the other things we want, we'll have to stop making software, airplanes, PowerWalls, yoga classes, COVID vaccine designs, and all the other things we're really good at and/or can't import.
So yes, the ultimate solution to shortages is to make more stuff. But onshoring is a way to guarantee we'll produce less stuff, globally speaking, than making things where it's efficient and shipping it. It's not a strategy without risks but it's not like other strategies don't have risks and downsides too.
Re: (Score:3)
I was struck by the author's plea near the end of the article:
That's a simple and deep question at the same time. Why can't we? Clearly, we could. I'm sure Elon Musk and team could spin up a container factory in three months.
I remember early in the pandemic when masks were in short supply, and a news outlet interviewed a domestic mask manufacturer as to why he did not ramp up to more shifts to meet the demand, and the owner's answer was pretty simple. He said that he could, but that the minute that slightly cheaper alternatives were available from overseas the demand for his masks would plummet, and he would be left with lots of extra workers that he would have to lay off. Laying off employees can increase a business's unemploy
Because your news media is fucking awful (Score:3, Insightful)
I've been talking for 11 months about the global shipping crisis, because that's my job...but the worthless news media is more interested in (depending on the channel) peddling woke pity-parties or ginning up right wing rage than, I dunno, reporting actual meaningful news?
At the same time, because the former resident of the WH was an orange-tinted buffoon, we've now instead elected a restraintless kleptocracy who only sees business as a source of tax-farming to feed the ever-hungry maw of more expansive government. Literally they're arguing over how much MORE they can/should/must take from us (they have a 'mandate' doncha know) and their ocd is about ensuring that 0.1% of the population has the right bathroom to visit than making sure the other 99.9% of people HAVE THE GOODS THEY NEED TO LIVE.
This has been a worsening issue since NOV 2020. Nearly a full year, and the only whisper on the news are some misguided crap about "well a ship got stuck in Suez so that must have caused it". Sigh. Not even faintly true within orders of magnitude.
It is only getting worse. There is no end in sight. Carrier congestion will accelerate to/through CNY but there's no systemically obvious point that "ok, by this time everything should be better." ...we're planning this to last all through 2022.
My company has factories that have basically stopped taking orders through 2022...they're already full up to capacity. We've increased prices thrice in the last 9 months in reaction to Asian-import transport costs that have gone up 10x. Airfreight is 5-8x. And that's if you can find ships or planes to carry it at all.
Right now there are more than 70 ships parked outside Los Angeles harbor, waiting to unload. In normal times, they would process and be sailing to the next port in rotation in 24-72 hours. Now they wait WEEKS.
That is roughly 850,000 truckloads of stuff. And likely another similar amount is filling the piers, sitting for 2-7 weeks to go out for delivery or outbound rail.
Think about those numbers. 1.5+ million truckloads of stuff just sitting at ONE port (granted, LALGB is about 40% of US imports).
Every other port is as-bad or worse.
You are only starting to see the tip of it in the consumer markets.
That $1 notebook you bought for your kid for school? It's only there because Target ate what, about $9 million in a/f charges for last minute school supplies? How long do you think Target can keep selling those for $1 when it costs them $5 just to get it to the store?
I'm no eschatological nutter but we as a family absolutely have been and setting aside basement space for more and more storage of staples we'd NEVER have considered bunkering: water, batteries, long-storable food items, etc.
Give it 6 more months and then it might start to get real to more people.
JIT (Score:5, Interesting)
While everyone in here wants to yell and scream at the opposite political party⦠I truly think that this has more to do with businesses relying too heavily on Just In Time inventory management/manufacturing.
Back in the day you would stock months worth of parts that are critical to your business. Through the 80s and 90s JIT came into vogue and businesses started running âoeleanâ⦠where the parts they needed would show up at exactly the right time.
Unfortunately, this meant that any disruption to the global supply chain could cascade⦠and boy has it. If companies would have had plenty of inventory of parts and products then the system could have absorbed some of the slowdown instead of grinding everything to a halt.
It will be interesting to see if businesses change their practices after this gets cleaned up. There is no doubt that businesses are currently losing out on many possible sales (and hence $$). The next time this happens (and it will) the businesses that learned their lesson will be in a great position to capitalize on the situation.
China? (Score:3)
China basically owns the shipping industry, and here in Europe things aren't so bad. Our shipments are getting here faster than ever.
I think there is a good chance that China simply stopped prioritizing the US. After all, shipping to the US is expensive since China would send empty ships home or would have to carry soy which they are already sourcing cheaper elsewhere.
And don't bring up England, many of us just stopped working with them. Too much work for too little gain. When they suggested I'd have to find an international accountant to file the right forms to do business with the UK, I simply moved my business elsewhere.
Not enough workers (Score:3)
I live in a smallish, relatively isolated community. We have a mix of service industry and manufacturing industry. I can't name one single business that is fully staffed. Doesn't matter if it is a factory manufacturing Gatorade, a local grocery store, a fast food restaurant, or departments in our hospital. NO ONE can get people to work. Our population is unchanged. People haven't moved away. COVID hasn't killed any significant portion of our population (93 dead out of a population of nearly 30,000).
The reason is very, very simple. Government stimulus, and allowing people to claim fear of COVID as a valid reason for unemployment. There's a portion of the population who would rather just break even and have the basic necessities to live if they don't have to work. They won't get ahead, or afford new things, etc, but they haven't had to work to keep a roof over their head and have something to eat, and that's adequate enough for them.
Re:If only we knew (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm amazed that people complain about same day deliveries taking longer. Seriously? How did the founding fathers of America get along when their toilet paper wasn't delivered the same day? Amazing the sorts of intense deprivation they were under. Seriously, I think the problem is that we're so used to just-in-time everywhere that when this system starts breaking we're not prepared to do things the old fashioned way from 2015. Buy what you need in advance, in person at a store, do all your shopping at once instead of buying one thing at a time and waiting for the peasants to deliver it, stock up your pantry, get extra toilet paper, walk more and drive less etc. It's the American Way.
What we've learned is that having some leeway in the supply chain is good, saving up is good, not demanding instant gratification is good, and that wearin a mask and getting a vaccine is better than whining like a triggered snowflake about your lost freedoms to infect your neighbors. Get over the pandemic then we get back to normal, pretending that the pandemic doesn't exist and that the virus is a plot just keeps us mired down.
I woldn't worry about power mad dictators, Trump is out of office and not likely to get back in.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
No we have learned vaccines might save lives but ones with non-sterilizing immunity like these don't stop disease like covid from running all over the population and damping the economy. We have learned nothing about masks, only lab studies the weakest kind of evidence suggest they help, observational studies and actual clinical trials to support their use don't exist and the level of infection in high compliance regions vs low compliance regions before the vaccines suggests they do next to nothing.
As far d
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How did the founding fathers of America get along when their toilet paper wasn't delivered the same day?
The United States was founded in 1776. Toilet paper wasn't even invented here until the mid 1800's. But at least we had corn cobs.
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If it bleeds it leads, is the old newspaper axiom.
Spot shortages are going to happen, but it's onerous that the media once again amplifies BS. Oh, no dollys for Xmas!
It's an excuse for businesses to creep up prices, especially the oil cabal. Yep, there are a few shortages here and there. And people will, like sheep, go on a hording mission like the ones seen early in the pandemic. Then... it will all even out, and no one will go without, save the underclass, who are no longer subsidized in any meaningful wa
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It's not just at the consumer level. A lot of factories have moved to just-in-time inventory as well - both for their manufacturing and their suppliers. That's the biggest aggravator to the situation. Nobody is storing anything. It's a huge house of cards and it's all slowly collapsing.
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If only we knew lockdowns and economic shutdowns would have such profound, long term effects on everything from supplies to our children.
So does overflowing hospitals.
... it was finding out how many voters are content with that. How many cheered it.
"It was really surprising how many voters didn't want to get sick!!!11one!!"
As you can see here: The trick to sounding profound is to leave out the crucially important detail. Throw the text over a picture of Kermit the Frog and you have a pandemic research paper ready to submit to Facebook.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
We do know that actually. We have had pandemics before, a civil war, and two world wars; some of which have put equal or greater dents in the productive portions of the US population; the economy did just fine.
History tells us you can definitely kill off 2-3% of the working age US population and the economy will come roaring right back if you let it. The lock downs were much riskier than doing nothing - downright irresponsible from a public policy perspective to take such a risk.
Re:If only we knew (Score:4, Insightful)
Given that the vast majority of deaths would have been the elderly who are mostly retired, it would probably have had much less of an impact on the economy than the lockdowns.
The death rate amongst those of working age is low, and is eclipsed by other causes of death. The death rate may have been higher than average, but not high enough to cause major problems.
The vast majority of children probably wouldn't have noticed anything or been affected at all. But they certainly noticed the lockdowns, home schooling, shortage of goods etc.
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Well the working age range is 15-64 [stlouisfed.org] with a great increase of COVID-19 deaths starting at 54+ [statista.com]. So that's ten years of productive workers lost to COVID-19.
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Well the working age range is 15-64 [stlouisfed.org] with a great increase of COVID-19 deaths starting at 54+ [statista.com]. So that's ten years of productive workers lost to COVID-19.
Your "ten years of productive workers lost to covid" is 122,000 deaths out of over 27,000,000 workers. You're either not thinking through your conclusion very well, or you're just full of shit.
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Given that the vast majority of deaths would have been the elderly who are mostly retired, it would probably have had much less of an impact on the economy than the lockdowns.
That is a totally evil philosophy. You seem to think that the economy is all that matters in life. If loads of old folks die, that makes the economy more efficient, so that's OK. Jesus wept.
I am venturing into old folks territory, being over legal retirement age, though still working. Working from home is a great boon. I have to mess about with health care doodahs, but other than that, I can do useful work. That is how it should be,
Re:If only we knew (Score:5, Insightful)
First, a large percentage of the elderly still work.
Second, the elderly account for a very large amount of spending. Dead people stop spending money for some strange reason.
Third, the elderly that don't have wealth typically provide services to their younger relatives. Like free daycare so that mom and dad can work. When grandma dies, daycare takes more than mom or dad's entire low-wage paycheck.
Fourth, and the biggest issue, is death isn't the only negative outcome from COVID infection. There are about 3.4M people in the US with "long COVID", and are thus now disabled. For scale, 3.4M is about the number of fast food workers in the US in 2019.
The fact that you folks can't possibly conceive of any effects beyond an individual dying is a demonstration of just how fucking stupid you all are.
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It's hard to say whether, in the long run, we might have seen fewer people die/less impact on society had we just but the bullet.
A lot of old people died from the original covid despite all the measures taken... now we have at least half a dozen variants and I just read in the news yesterday that the current wave puts 10 to 20 year olds into hospitals...
Maybe if we had let covid run its course, we would have all had base immunity once the mutations came along...
But let's rejoice! At least now hospital false
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I so wish this site had an edit function...
*bit the bullet
*no hospital
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That's far from the only problem with that post.
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Maybe if we had let covid run its course, we would have all had base immunity once the mutations came along...
How do you think the mutations came along in the first place?
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
This shitshow started under Trump (remember the TP shortage and horrendous postal delays?), and it would've continued under Trump had he won re-election. Anyone who believed Biden would be able to wave a magic wand and immediately restore America to a pre-Covid normal is a fool. Biden won the election because the majority of the country was simply tired of having a narcissistic petulant man-child in the oval office.
Re:If only we knew (Score:5, Informative)
Your TP shortages were not supply chain issues, they were the result of massive panic buying (much like hand sanitizer, etc). That said, your overall point is true: the supply chain issues we're seeing now would have almost certainly have happened regardless of who was in the white house.
THAT said, this doesn't undermine the GP's point about "Biden's America." The Biden administration so far has been entirely ineffectual. I'm having difficulty coming up with one single situation where their response to an issue has been a positive one, and numerous situations where they have done nothing or actively made things worse by their actions.
Some of Biden's first acts were to reverse the Trump era policy on the southern border and to ban fracking, and--predictably, by anyone other than a CNN analyst--we have a border crisis and high global natural gas prices that shortly followed. They were widely praised for "bold action" in putting so many shots into arms, when the proposed number was the same as what was already happening when they took office. Their own party is divided on the domestic agenda, Biden's alleged corruption is as bad as anything alleged about Trump.
I'm not a fan of Darth Cheeto, but "different" is not always "better" and can sometimes be "much worse,"
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It was biden and harris that were out there telling public that vaccine could not be trusted.
Re: If only we knew (Score:3)
Makes sense to me: the guy was as mad as a cut snake, looked at eclipses, and talked about injecting bleach.
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And if Trump had done his job, we'd be over all this by now. but instead, he made it political and convinced the dumber 1/3 of the country that refusing vaccines, masks and other sensible measures was a partisan stand.
Trump was following here. He's a follower, and if he thinks something will get him more votes, he'll go along with it.
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instead, he made it political and convinced the dumber 1/3 of the country
I think it was closer to 5/11's of the country, but that's just quibbling.
Re:If only we knew (Score:5, Informative)
Idiot. This was caused by a lack of preparation. It would have been much much worse with no lockdowns. In that respect, this pandemic is exactly the same as all the others we've had. And in every case, historically and now, economies that locked down first, and hardest, recovered the quickest. It's not rocket science. We know how this works. We've known for hundreds of years. The historical data doesn't lie.
This is a apples and oranges comparison with regards to history. The appropriate reaction is radically different when no game changing medical intervention (vaccines, treatment) are forthcoming.
Australia locked down so hard they had basically no cases for 9 months prior to the last three. That quickest "recovery" is not going so well for them now. They are under exceptionally draconian lockdowns here in late 2021 while their economy is getting worse as a result while there are basically no restrictions in the US.
And if Trump had done his job, we'd be over all this by now. but instead, he made it political and convinced the dumber 1/3 of the country that refusing vaccines, masks and other sensible measures was a partisan stand.
I don't understand. I wholeheartedly agree Trump is a certified circus clown but he pushed and touted the vaccines hard. He did Warp speed and gave the drug companies billions. He threatened FDA officials to green light the EUA before the election and continuously touted Vaccines in public.
Partisan refusal to "get the shot" materialized AFTER Trump's tenure. My perspective on what happened mandates and remnants of lockdowns created extremely motivated groups to build consensus against the infringement of their rights and as a result the issue of whether to get the vaccine was hopelessly intertwined with outrage over mandates. A basic tenant of governance by consent had been broken. You can only beat down outliers... You can't have policy a significant portion of the population vehemently disagrees with without losing legitimacy and with it infliction of collateral damage upon society.
masks and other sensible measures was a partisan stand.
The largest real world study of its kind involving 320000 people in Bangladesh reported the benefit of cloth masks as "an imprecise zero". I'm all for policy that makes sense. While I don't agree with mandates for masks that actually work at least such mandates would be coherent.
I mean, we know that certain countries hate America and are spreading lies about the pandemic to weaken us and make us look idiotic on the international stage. Are you being paid by Russia or China? Or are you just ignorant?
As Biden is so fond of saying its always appropriate to question judgment and never appropriate to question motives. If you disagree with someone's perspective address it on the merits. Whether or not one happens to be a paid Russian shill makes no difference.
Re:If only we knew (Score:5, Interesting)
It was Biden and Harris before the election that told people not to trust them
When you think "Its telling you have to lie", it's probably not a good idea to lie yourself.
First, Biden didn't say anything like you claim.
Second, Harris said she would not trust a vaccine that Trump said was safe, and the "experts" did not say was safe. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
It's so odd you folks keep lying about this over and over again. Almost like you don't actually give a fuck about the truth.
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Let's go Brandon... LOL
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I continue to see runs on odd items here Minneapolis, MN. These are things that I buy all the time. Some, I am sure are just because they are popular, but some I have never seen a problem with before recently.
- Old Style and Hamms beer
- Silk unsweetend organic soy milk
- Fancy Feast cat food
- Metamucil
- Cheerios cereal
- Various La Croix and other flavored sparkling water
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Agree 100% with everything you have there except this
Let's hope lending interest rates don't go into double-digits like they did then.
I hope rates do soar! That is the one thing that will clear out a lot of the lefty nonsense. It will bring real estate prices back down to something the working man can afford. It will make people think twice about student loans to get third ethnic studies degree, it will put all these retarded lets run the world on moonbeams and unicorn farts "green" nonsense companies out of business once and for all.
Nope we should hope rates go back 1980 levels as soon
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You people that vote with Feels not Facts did this to you. Those people who were oh so offended by the mean tweets voted in this weak, woke, pussy government we have now that can't or won't deal with anything.
Who exactly could I have voted for that would have stopped inflation?
Re: (Score:3)
If we're suffering because people slurping the government teat instead of going back to work like a responsible adult, why is encouraging them to go back to work "right wing bullshit" or "retarded"?
Sorry that you believe that we can freebie the entire country for years on end.
But out here in REALITY, that shit doesn't fly.