'Power to communities': Chicago considers city-owned grocery store to address 'food deserts' after giants like Walmart and Whole Foods shutter stores
'Power to communities': Chicago considers city-owned grocery store to address 'food deserts' after giants like Walmart and Whole Foods shutter stores
The mayor’s office says it would be the first major U.S. city to enact such a plan.
The mayor’s office says it would be the first major U.S. city to enact such a plan.
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Those stores left because of crime. Instead of fixing the root cause of major social issues, their Band-Aid is taxpayer funded stores? Why not just skip the middle man and send food to people directly? Or just set up taxpayer funded food banks. That’s effectively what these “stores” will turn into anyway. This just seems like performative nonsense, not intended to solve anything.
Is it “performative nonsense” because it’s Chicago, or was this city in Florida doing it years ago and this one in Kansas also “performative nonsense,” too?
Why do you think these examples are analogous? The stores in the towns described in the articles you linked didn’t shut down because of poverty or crime. In the examples you provided, collective supermarkets seem to be a good fit. Contrast this with the Chicago mayor, who cites poverty. If people can’t afford food anyway, and the business is going to face sky high theft, the plan doesn’t make sense. Cut out the middle man and just send poor people food. It would cost far less than trying to set up supermarkets from scratch and running them at a loss in perpetuity. Plus it means helping poor people, rather than forcing them to shop lift if they’re hungry.
Lack of shopping opportunities and an inability to pay for food are two separate things. They may often co-occur, but just sending food too poor people doesn't solve food deserts.
And separately from that, poor people deserve to be able to look at their produce, buy stuff last minute, or browse and buy what strikes their fancy too. All the reasons everyone else uses supermarkets should be available to poor people as well.
If the stores are government run, there is no profit motive. That means lower prices, which means more accessibility for the people who need it.
And who will be sending poor people food? Let me guess, we need to leave it up to churches and charities? Lol
Look at you tripping over yourself to lick the boot. Sad.
If the stores are government run, there is no profit motive. That means lower prices, which means more accessibility for the people who need it.
If these stores are going to be run at a loss anyway, why waste enormous sums of money on premises and other costs when they could just start food banks and give people the food directly? Or, as I suggest above, the government could send people food directly.
I’m suggesting that we give people free food and I’m the boot licker? Okay Bezos.
why waste enormous sums of money on premises and other costs when they could just start food banks
This runs into the problem of charity out-competing potential business ventures. Government subsidized private groceries, or public-private partnerships or just plain government run grocery stores can alleviate the problem of a food desert while still bringing the benefits of an active business to the area. The local government can increase or reduce its investment as needed, and it doesn't create a service that inherently can't be competed with by private business in a space that's already unprofitable/too risky to operate a business within
This runs into the problem of charity out-competing potential business ventures.
But this is moot as the city is planning to run loss-making stores where private stores are non-viable. There is no risk of outcompeting businesses which aren’t even there. And if there is a concern of outcompeting private stores, running stores offering cheaper products than any private store could do so in the area would destroy those businesses just as effectively.
The decision has been made to entirely sacrifice any pretence of private enterprise in the supermarket space in certain areas in Chicago. I’m merely arguing that, given this decision, there are more effectively ways to use public funds.
No, you're just pushing the tired old, "religious groups and charities should be feeding people, leave the government out of it" bullshit. It doesn't work.
you're pushing the tired old... "leave the government out of it" bullshit.
They literally said government was the solution in the message above yours. Regardless of the merits of @JasSmith@kbin.social 's argument, you've mischaracterised what they've said and that isn't fair or productive for discussion.
No, you’re just pushing the tired old, “religious groups and charities should be feeding people, leave the government out of it”
I’m literally saying the government should give people free food. You’re arguing with a straw man.
Those stores left because of crime
Not always...
For decades now developers have been buying commercial property and shutting down the business. This makes the area less desirable and lowers residential prices
When those are "low enough" developers buy them up
The next step is usually getting tax money to "redevelop" the area and then they'll reopen businesses and sell the residential at a high markup as an "up and coming neighborhood". It's just a money shuffle that hurts the majority of Americans and funnels wealth to the wealthy.
It's weird people still don't understand this...
Do you have some examples? IMHO, few shareholders are willing to weather decades of losses like that in the hope that one day their investment pays off. I’m not buying it. No one buys property and then intentionally devalues it.