news
Welcome to c/news! Please read the Hexbear Code of Conduct and remember... we're all comrades here.
Rules:
-- PLEASE KEEP POST TITLES INFORMATIVE --
-- Overly editorialized titles, particularly if they link to opinion pieces, may get your post removed. --
-- All posts must include a link to their source. Screenshots are fine IF you include the link in the post body. --
-- If you are citing a twitter post as news please include not just the twitter.com in your links but also nitter.net (or another Nitter instance). There is also a Firefox extension that can redirect Twitter links to a Nitter instance: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/libredirect/ or archive them as you would any other reactionary source using e.g. https://archive.today . Twitter screenshots still need to be sourced or they will be removed --
-- Mass tagging comm moderators across multiple posts like a broken markov chain bot will result in a comm ban--
-- Repeated consecutive posting of reactionary sources, fake news, misleading / outdated news, false alarms over ghoul deaths, and/or shitposts will result in a comm ban.--
-- Neglecting to use content warnings or NSFW when dealing with disturbing content will be removed until in compliance. Users who are consecutively reported due to failing to use content warnings or NSFW tags when commenting on or posting disturbing content will result in the user being banned. --
-- Using April 1st as an excuse to post fake headlines, like the resurrection of Kissinger while he is still fortunately dead, will result in the poster being thrown in the gamer gulag and be sentenced to play and beat trashy mobile games like 'Raid: Shadow Legends' in order to be rehabilitated back into general society. --
view the rest of the comments
If US factory farming wasn't subsidized by taxpayers' money the industry wold operate at a loss. The last guy I talked about this said that as it stands, they only make approximately $50 per cow after the cost of feeding and killing them.
I can't find the article but I read one once that stated that farmers need to feed beef cattles something like 11 times the amount of calories than what they produce. That's land being used just to feed cows instead of like cutting back on say, 80% of that land and being able to grow enough plants to feed the entire country
It's not that far fetched to say that if we stopped subsidizing the factory farming industry and instead subsidized plant-base ag, we could potentially feed the country for free. I know realistically that wouldn't even happen because the US government lets manufacturers and retail make up whatever prices they want.
We could right now. Not potentially, but completely and easily. With the amount of food that is intentionally just destroyed to maintain profits, we could do it. That's not to mention all the food that even makes onto the market and gets distributed but is thrown out at grocery stores and restaurants because it didn't sell fast enough, then tossed into dumpsters with bleach poured on it so unhoused people can't even dumpster dive for subsistence. The amount of food is not the issue, not at all. As always, it's the system and the greed of capitalists that perpetuate it that is the problem.
That said, I don't mean to detract from anything in your comment because it's accurate and you're right.
Yeah for sure but I was just referring to a hypothetical where we just stop using the money that is for factory farm subsidies and use it for sustainable plant-based ag.
In a better world, we wouldn't be throwing away 40% of the food made because it wasn't able to turn a profit. But in a better world, the US probably wouldn't spend $800 billion a year killing poor brown people in other countries too.
And tbh, attempting to pursue the food waste issues you mentioned might be an easier route to feed the population.
Probably won't happen since capitalism absolutely has to turn a profit even at the cost of people living.
This is true.
Or at least they'd need to raise the price of beef to its natural equilibrium point, where people would probably decide "I'll take the vegetarian option" on their own.
I've heard a few times that if people were to pay the real price for beef at the store, it would be something like $30 per lb. This is in contrast to the "vegan tax" where plant-based meat substitutes are artificially marked up in price to seem like the more expensive option.