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> when communities trade between each other > it comes back according to whatever goods and services you produce Extractive industry like Amazon kill the loca

> when communities trade between each other > it comes back according to whatever goods and services you produce Extractive industry like Amazon kill the local producers and siphon the money out of smaller areas and concentrate it in richer areas. When there are no local producers or wealth left, what is there to circulate or trade? Amazon is an Internet-myelinated version of the Wal-Mart effect, with more packaging waste.

crazygringo 2y ago
> When there are no local producers or wealth left, what is there to circulate or trade? If that were true, then sure it would be a problem. But I don't know of many communities in the US where there are literally no jobs, nothing being produced at all. Where economic activity is zero. Some jobs go away and new ones arise. And remote work makes it easier than ever for jobs to move from cities to smaller areas. Can you really show that Amazon has had a net effect of shifting wealth "out of smaller areas" and into richer ones? Especially when you consider the amount of money it saves people in smaller areas, which makes them more wealthy than they would be otherwise?
- mckn1ght 2y ago
  I cannot. I am operating on an assumption that each dollar that goes to Amazon vs a local producer is an opportunity cost for the community’s long-term wealth. Saving a few bucks here and there on individual purchases seems like short-term thinking and small potatoes. Scaled up, that is what lead to rust belt decay after offshoring so much manufacturing. I know a lot of ink has been spilled on the effects of walmart and dollar stores on local economies, but I will also admit that I have not done any legwork to vet the hypotheses or conclusions, or if I have, I’ve forgotten and wouldn’t be able to produce any citations. As far as I can get in systems thinking with the initial conditions I know, which is assuredly a small subset of the totality of reality, the concentration of ability to produce and purchasing power is dangerous for those in the leaf nodes. I’m always interested to see more data proving me more right right or wrong on this.

crazygringo 2y ago

> When there are no local producers or wealth left, what is there to circulate or trade? If that were true, then sure it would be a problem. But I don't know of many communities in the US where there are literally no jobs, nothing being produced at all. Where economic activity is zero. Some jobs go away and new ones arise. And remote work makes it easier than ever for jobs to move from cities to smaller areas. Can you really show that Amazon has had a net effect of shifting wealth "out of smaller areas" and into richer ones? Especially when you consider the amount of money it saves people in smaller areas, which makes them more wealthy than they would be otherwise?

mckn1ght 2y ago
I cannot. I am operating on an assumption that each dollar that goes to Amazon vs a local producer is an opportunity cost for the community’s long-term wealth. Saving a few bucks here and there on individual purchases seems like short-term thinking and small potatoes. Scaled up, that is what lead to rust belt decay after offshoring so much manufacturing. I know a lot of ink has been spilled on the effects of walmart and dollar stores on local economies, but I will also admit that I have not done any legwork to vet the hypotheses or conclusions, or if I have, I’ve forgotten and wouldn’t be able to produce any citations. As far as I can get in systems thinking with the initial conditions I know, which is assuredly a small subset of the totality of reality, the concentration of ability to produce and purchasing power is dangerous for those in the leaf nodes. I’m always interested to see more data proving me more right right or wrong on this.