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This kind of thing makes me sad WRT the realities of modern life. Why is it that when we think "Oh we lack local shops for basic food stuffs" that we think, "W

This kind of thing makes me sad WRT the realities of modern life. Why is it that when we think "Oh we lack local shops for basic food stuffs" that we think, "We need to entice multi-billion dollar operations into this area to service our poor people". What about, "We need local people to open up local mom & pop stores"? Why can't we think, "We need to provide incentives, education and security for local people to pull themselves up by the bootstraps and service themselves" instead of "We need to find a way to funnel money from poor people to rich people"? I totally understand that I'm misrepresenting the actual thinking going on here :-). People in the west are so far removed from traditional ways of doing things that they think that the only way to buy food is to have a 2 acre parking lot for minivans and a stadium sized store with razor thin margins selling pre-packaged food. Around the world, poor people start small stores and sell things to other poor people. People walk to the store because they don't own cars. They carry their food for today because they don't own refrigerators. And it's definitely not as efficient, but it keeps the money local.

Ancalagon 7y ago
At least in the US I think it’s an economy-of-scale thing. People get used to products at specific prices, because they’re used to shopping at the big box stores. Then when an independent or mom-and-pop store opens, their prices are a bit higher because they can’t survive on such small margins. Then there’s sticker shock by the customer, the independent store gets bought out or closes due to lack of money, and the cycle repeats or another big box retailer moves in.
- adrianratnapala 7y ago
  It is not always economically rational though. The US has a history of using eminent domain to grab neighbourhoods full of small businesses so that they can be turned over to a big development projects of nominally higher value. Then the big developer pulls out or goes bankrupt, and the result is a ruined, rat-infested empty lot. Those cases involving eminent domain and rats are the most dramatic, but it works at a more pedestrian level too. Say a government wants to dispose of some disused rail-yard or something. A developer who says "I'm going build some big shiny shops and attractions here" has better optics than a developer who says "I'm going to lay down some infrastructure and parcel the land up to whoever wants to buy it, nature will decide what the land is used for". The latter is actually quite likely to produce the higher economic value land use, but there is no good political narrative. And in a world of strict zoning rules, there might not even be a legal framework for it.
Spooky23 7y ago
Those store owners might form an association that could challenge the status quo. Instead, we figure out ways to scale insane business models. Amazon is the greatest achievement of financial engineering ever. It adds inefficiency in many markets if anything.
newshorts 7y ago
To further this point a bit... I grew up in a small town with a mostly local mom and pop shops. As our population grew, so did the store size. Eventually Walmart came in and wiped out several local shops. We watched business owners who lived, worked, hired and spent money in our community close up shop. Walmart & others are a vacuum for money, sucking up local dollars and redirecting it to shareholders. I have nothing against naked capitalism, but these large companies aren’t producing the results we want. Unless you’re a shareholder...
em-bee 7y ago
local empowerment, allowing small communities to help themselves instead of being controlled from the outside is really the key to future prosperity. a small town should be able to decide on their own if they allow someone like walmarts to outcompete their local stores.

Ancalagon 7y ago

At least in the US I think it’s an economy-of-scale thing. People get used to products at specific prices, because they’re used to shopping at the big box stores. Then when an independent or mom-and-pop store opens, their prices are a bit higher because they can’t survive on such small margins. Then there’s sticker shock by the customer, the independent store gets bought out or closes due to lack of money, and the cycle repeats or another big box retailer moves in.

adrianratnapala 7y ago
It is not always economically rational though. The US has a history of using eminent domain to grab neighbourhoods full of small businesses so that they can be turned over to a big development projects of nominally higher value. Then the big developer pulls out or goes bankrupt, and the result is a ruined, rat-infested empty lot. Those cases involving eminent domain and rats are the most dramatic, but it works at a more pedestrian level too. Say a government wants to dispose of some disused rail-yard or something. A developer who says "I'm going build some big shiny shops and attractions here" has better optics than a developer who says "I'm going to lay down some infrastructure and parcel the land up to whoever wants to buy it, nature will decide what the land is used for". The latter is actually quite likely to produce the higher economic value land use, but there is no good political narrative. And in a world of strict zoning rules, there might not even be a legal framework for it.

Spooky23 7y ago

Those store owners might form an association that could challenge the status quo. Instead, we figure out ways to scale insane business models. Amazon is the greatest achievement of financial engineering ever. It adds inefficiency in many markets if anything.

newshorts 7y ago

To further this point a bit... I grew up in a small town with a mostly local mom and pop shops. As our population grew, so did the store size. Eventually Walmart came in and wiped out several local shops. We watched business owners who lived, worked, hired and spent money in our community close up shop. Walmart & others are a vacuum for money, sucking up local dollars and redirecting it to shareholders. I have nothing against naked capitalism, but these large companies aren’t producing the results we want. Unless you’re a shareholder...

em-bee 7y ago

local empowerment, allowing small communities to help themselves instead of being controlled from the outside is really the key to future prosperity. a small town should be able to decide on their own if they allow someone like walmarts to outcompete their local stores.