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I see this asserted frequently, but I'm not convinced it's true. Focusing on agriculture, say that in 2020 a vindictive President Warren passes the Farmer Retri

I see this asserted frequently, but I'm not convinced it's true. Focusing on agriculture, say that in 2020 a vindictive President Warren passes the Farmer Retribution Bill, banning commercial agriculture in the US, effective 2024. Would people starve in the streets, or would food prices rise slightly as international markets massively increase production and export to the US? Considering how much California and Mexico produce I already see in New York my hunch is that food can be shipped cheaply and efficiently, but I'm not basing that on much, and wasn't able to find any relevant research.

war1025 8y ago
I would guess that you are massively out of touch with how much agriculture there is in America.
- ben_w 8y ago
  Without googling, I would estimate 50% by land area, between 1% and 5% of GDP. As America is about 5% of the world population, it wouldn’t significantly alter everyone else’s food production to supply you, leaving only the question of transport logistics. The frozen pizza right in front of me is 240 cal per hundred grams; assume the average American consumes 3000 cal per day and that pizza is a representative calorie density, 1.25kg per person per day = 148 million metric tons per year. Googling now, USA ports handle 2.3 billion tons per year [1], so that’s fine. Internal transport I don’t even have to think about because you must already have it in place or you’d already be starving because you couldn’t get the food from your own farms to your own shops. [1] Figure 3-2 https://www.bts.gov/sites/bts.dot.gov/files/docs/browse-statistical-products-and-data/port-performance/216906/bts-ppfsp-ar-congress-2017.pdf#page28 https://www.bts.gov/sites/bts.dot.gov/files/docs/browse-stat...
- yellowstuff 8y ago
  It's about 1% of GDP and employs less than 2% of the population.
  - war1025 8y ago
    Wikipedia says 922 million acres of land are used for agriculture in the United States, or about 40% of the total area of the country. I would guess that you'd have a hard time finding that much spare land lying around. Particularly in places that have the soil and infrastructure needed to support farming.
    - yellowstuff 8y ago
      The population of the US is only 330 million. It's a net exporter of food, and Americans eat much more meat than most of the world, but even if you round up to the equivalent of feeding an extra billion people it looks like it's within the realm of possibility to replace all that agriculture: https://www.livescience.com/16493-people-planet-earth-support.html https://www.livescience.com/16493-people-planet-earth-suppor... And this article claims that the limiting factor is transportation infrastructure, not food production: https://www.theguardian.com/preparing-for-9-billion/2017/sep/13/population-feed-planet-2050-cold-chain-environment https://www.theguardian.com/preparing-for-9-billion/2017/sep... If that's the case then it seems like it's definitely possible. The US has good transportation infrastructure.
whynotminot 8y ago
This doesn't even make sense as a hypothetical.
- yellowstuff 8y ago
  Why not? People assert that cities need the food grown in rural areas, so that implies the hypothetical that cities would suffer a lot without the rural areas. That goes against my general economic belief that production of easily transported goods in one country is usually easily replaced by production in another country, without large changes in prices anywhere.
berti 8y ago
Even if that were to make economic sense (it doesn't), you'd still have a major defence issue relying entirely on external food supply.
- yellowstuff 8y ago
  I will grant you the defense issue, that's important. But everyone commenting finds the economic argument so obvious that no one's bothered to make it. In normal times, why would moving food production out of the United States have a more significant effect than displacing some other industry of similar size (1% of GDP, about 2% of employment)?

war1025 8y ago

I would guess that you are massively out of touch with how much agriculture there is in America.

ben_w 8y ago
Without googling, I would estimate 50% by land area, between 1% and 5% of GDP. As America is about 5% of the world population, it wouldn’t significantly alter everyone else’s food production to supply you, leaving only the question of transport logistics. The frozen pizza right in front of me is 240 cal per hundred grams; assume the average American consumes 3000 cal per day and that pizza is a representative calorie density, 1.25kg per person per day = 148 million metric tons per year. Googling now, USA ports handle 2.3 billion tons per year [1], so that’s fine. Internal transport I don’t even have to think about because you must already have it in place or you’d already be starving because you couldn’t get the food from your own farms to your own shops. [1] Figure 3-2 https://www.bts.gov/sites/bts.dot.gov/files/docs/browse-statistical-products-and-data/port-performance/216906/bts-ppfsp-ar-congress-2017.pdf#page28 https://www.bts.gov/sites/bts.dot.gov/files/docs/browse-stat...
yellowstuff 8y ago
It's about 1% of GDP and employs less than 2% of the population.
- war1025 8y ago
  Wikipedia says 922 million acres of land are used for agriculture in the United States, or about 40% of the total area of the country. I would guess that you'd have a hard time finding that much spare land lying around. Particularly in places that have the soil and infrastructure needed to support farming.
  - yellowstuff 8y ago
    The population of the US is only 330 million. It's a net exporter of food, and Americans eat much more meat than most of the world, but even if you round up to the equivalent of feeding an extra billion people it looks like it's within the realm of possibility to replace all that agriculture: https://www.livescience.com/16493-people-planet-earth-support.html https://www.livescience.com/16493-people-planet-earth-suppor... And this article claims that the limiting factor is transportation infrastructure, not food production: https://www.theguardian.com/preparing-for-9-billion/2017/sep/13/population-feed-planet-2050-cold-chain-environment https://www.theguardian.com/preparing-for-9-billion/2017/sep... If that's the case then it seems like it's definitely possible. The US has good transportation infrastructure.

whynotminot 8y ago

This doesn't even make sense as a hypothetical.

yellowstuff 8y ago
Why not? People assert that cities need the food grown in rural areas, so that implies the hypothetical that cities would suffer a lot without the rural areas. That goes against my general economic belief that production of easily transported goods in one country is usually easily replaced by production in another country, without large changes in prices anywhere.

berti 8y ago

Even if that were to make economic sense (it doesn't), you'd still have a major defence issue relying entirely on external food supply.

yellowstuff 8y ago
I will grant you the defense issue, that's important. But everyone commenting finds the economic argument so obvious that no one's bothered to make it. In normal times, why would moving food production out of the United States have a more significant effect than displacing some other industry of similar size (1% of GDP, about 2% of employment)?