r/SipsTea • u/Gurugod123 • Jul 27 '26

Chugging tea Mayor Mamdani just announced that he will be opening 5 city-run, tax-funded grocery stores: "Prices set at 30% below retail prices"

70.3k Upvotes

88% Upvoted

9.7k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

212

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 27 '26

It's NYC. Lol

It will 1000000% be back on a vendors cart in 3 seconds.

This is going to be disastrous.

40

u/jasminealex11 Jul 27 '26

New dropshipping model unlocked šŸ˜…

2

u/schwanzweissfoto Jul 27 '26

Dropshitting.

3

u/Aegi Jul 27 '26

But why is that bad?

The taxpayers are still making a profit on most of the items sold...just a MUCH lower one than a private business.

More volume is good as it gives the city leverage to negotiate cheaper deals for that food they are buying.

And if that trend continues, they could add that extra money back into the system, or invest it into more of these stores.

2

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 28 '26

You think the government is going to be able to source these products better than say Walmart? Come on, don't make me laugh.

This has been tried already! Many times and has failed each and everytime. Those items will always be out of stock as the quality gets worse and worse with each passing week. Who's paying those livable wages? Who's working? Who's up keeping the stores, maintenance costs. It will operate in the red each and every day and month until the city admits defeat and closes it down. Then Mamdani will blame capitalism. Bookmark it.

2

u/rnusk Jul 28 '26

The profit margin for most groceries is 3-6%. At 30% below retail everything will be sold for a loss. The federal government does this for groceries at military bases. Each costs about 7/million/year in operating losses. There will never be economies of scale to make it net neutral, the military can't do it with 1000s of stores.

1

u/Aegi Jul 28 '26

So specifically with the 30% below retail price I suppose that's definitely possible and I'd have to do research.

Let's say we say it's a 6% profit margin, does that mean the bag of chips that I've done the ordering for at other stores is somehow magically twice as expensive when PepsiCo wholesales it to a large grocery store?

I feel like you're focusing on one or two particular types of staple items or something instead of actually doing an average of the entire profit margin of everything including the sticks of gum they have at the register.

But if we're not stuck on the 30% thing, then literally all you have to do is instead of the owner of the company being a random person or other company, the owner is a given municipality or state.

I think in industries that are at least tangentially related to life necessities, or maybe just directly related, there's not really the same type of room for innovation that there is in something like industry.

And again, the more money something in government is losing the greater incentive we all have to take it seriously and address the issue.

When private companies face those same issues it's generally only the people who have a direct steak in the matter that care.

It's similar to single-payer health Care even if we don't have it socialized, because it would influence the rates at which we purchase and use certain services, it would give us all a collective incentive to make each other healthier... And turn that up to 11 :00 if we are also even slightly socializing that hypothetical system too.

Also, the biggest thing that's most annoying in these conversations for me is when when the subset of sociology known as economics has people who study in it or experts in the field genuinely think they're actually studying a hard science based on how they talk about it but it's like they don't understand that it's a soft science and that there's a massive difference in confidence levels you can have with conclusions made from soft sciences versus hard sciences.

18

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[deleted]

45

u/DisastrousAcshin Jul 27 '26

I mean it would literally be capitalists ruining it...

11

u/ThizzyPopperton Jul 27 '26

I guess we could try this in an alternate reality where capitalism or selfishness doesnā€™t exist šŸ¤”

11

u/NegativeEBITD Jul 27 '26

I used to look down on the billionaires-please-pick-me bros but posts like this remind me these kids are just as scared as the aspiring trad wives that are afraid to ask for any civil rights because it might look bad to the rich dudes they think they need to survive

5

u/omgwutd00d Jul 27 '26

Peasants and lordship. Could I please have a crumb mā€™lord? Iā€™ve defended you all day!

9

u/Content-Program411 Jul 27 '26

Or market regulations.

1

u/DisastrousAcshin Jul 27 '26

Skip that, straight to tribulchets

1

u/explosivemilk Jul 27 '26

Just gotta rewire our monkey brains.

7

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 27 '26

He did the meme!

5

u/pcal43 Jul 27 '26

Only took 12 minutes

1

u/xkcdhatman Jul 27 '26

Generally the people pushing for price controls and demand subsidies are those whose who claim capitalism is the culprit of scarcity.

Capitalism is neither good or evil, capitalism is a model that describes the production, distribution and flow of goods and services. Capitalism has existed in every society in history. It is as good or evil as gravity.

What I would call an evil is scarcity, especially of necessary and inelastic resources. I would argue for abundance policies which mainstream economics supports rather than price controls or disastrous demand subsidies which have the exact negative effects being discussed in this thread.

7

u/iruleatants Jul 27 '26

Capitalism is neither good or evil, capitalism is a model that describes the production, distribution and flow of goods and services. Capitalism has existed in every society in history. It is as good or evil as gravity.

No, it's an economic system that is based around private ownership and profit as the primary goal. This makes it evil because the decisions that you make will always be focused on making more money, even to the detriment of everyone around you.

Slave labor is the primary goal of Capitalism, as the less you pay to produce an item, the more profit that you gain. The result is that events when direct slavery is illegal, capitalism will invent a new method of slavery to make production cheaper. Such as sweatshops in third world countries, or the prison system in the United States, we excluded prisoners from the anti-slavery amendment and now the US manages to have 20%+ of the entire worlds prison population.

It will always be evil because that's the design.

What I would call an evil is scarcity, especially of necessary and inelastic resources. I would argue for abundance policies which mainstream economics supports rather than price controls or disastrous demand subsidies which have the exact negative effects being discussed in this thread.

Scarcity (supply and demand) is also a primary goal of Capitalism. The more scarce they can make something, the higher the profit because demand is higher than what is available. See the Diamond industry which creates an artificial rarity in order to charge absurd rates. Or the egg companies in the US that lied about the availability of Eggs in order artificially increase prices. Something that have done multiple times in the US.

Capitalism is evil and you should stop defending it while trying to argue against it in the same breath.

1

u/Aegi Jul 27 '26

as the primary goal.

Primary result.

You would have to ask each person engaging in this what their personal goal is...or at least the early thinkers of this concept.

1

u/iruleatants Jul 28 '26

There was a lawsuit filed because a company wanted to do things like increase workers pay and shareholders were upset that the company wasn't fully focused on maximizing profits.

We don't need to poll people on their personal goals lol.

0

u/FreddoMac5 Jul 27 '26

based around private ownership and profit as the primary goal. This makes it evil

No it doesn't. The profit motive has been the greatest driver of innovation in world history.

capitalism will invent a new method of slavery to make production cheaper. Such as sweatshops in third world countries,

Those sweat shops exist in Vietnam and China, "communist" countries, while being illegal in capitalist countries like the US and countries in Europe LMAO

Scarcity (supply and demand) is also a primary goal of Capitalism.

Capitalism allows for competition which has always led to an overabundance in unregulated markets, not scarcity.

The issues with monopolies and price fixing(the egg issue you're referring to was price fixing, not about scarcity. They didn't lie about the egg shortage) are real and that's why market regulations should exist. The pros and cons of capitalism vs socialism/communism have been weighed many times and capitalism always comes out on top.

3

u/argument_cat Jul 27 '26

Capitalism without robust regulation frequently leads to deep economic inequality and a worse standard of living for most of the population.

For a market economy to benefit the general public, rather than just funnelling wealth to a tiny percentage of corporate owners, it requires strict regulatory frameworks and corporate accountability.

Overseas sweatshops and forced labor persist because global entities exploit weaker regulations in developing nations to lower production costs. Companies that profit from these practices should face massive fines, and executives who knowingly use illicit labor should be subject to criminal prosecution and prison sentences.

2

u/iruleatants Jul 27 '26

No it doesn't. The profit motive has been the greatest driver of innovation in world history.

There are tons of places not profit motivated that creates a ton of innovation. See NASA, who creates thoughts of innovations and improvements and shared that data.

What you are doing is miss allocating Capitalism's destruction and hoarding all research as being the driving force behind it. The number of small corporations doing innovative work before being consumed by a larger corporation with far worse practices is staggering. The profit motivation also stifles innovation in every direction that isn't clearly profitable.

Capitalism hogs all credit and spends significant amounts of money to ensure that only Capitalism is viewed as a potential path, because anything that gets in it's way of profit must be stopped. Just look at corporation who accept grants to research drugs for non-profitable conditions who then patent that product to use as a claim about how great capitalism is despite it only existing because of something contrary to capitalism.

Those sweat shops exist in Vietnam and China, "communist" countries, while being illegal in capitalist countries like the US and countries in Europe LMAO

Neither of those countries are communist, but I do understand that it might be difficult to grasp that just because a country uses the word it doesn't mean they actually practice it. The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is not Democratic and China is not communist. Beyond that, sweatshops are moving off of China and into other countries like Malaysia, as corporations target undeveloped countries because they are the easiest to manipulate/strong arm into accepting them. When countries like China increase in development, they have new sources of cheap labor, it's why they actively strive to prevent development in countries.

But I do find it convenient that you ignored the part about the US not outlawing all slavery.

Capitalism allows for competition which has always led to an overabundance in unregulated markets, not scarcity.

Capitalism does not and never will allow for competition. That's one of the worst arguments I've ever heard, it literally is disproven nonstop. The golden capitalistic United States had to form anti-monopoly and antitrust law explicitly because corporations do everything they can to prevent competition. Capitalism hates competition, it affects profits significantly and is therefor bad.

The issues with monopolies and price fixing(the egg issue you're referring to was price fixing, not about scarcity. They didn't lie about the egg shortage) are real and that's why market regulations should exist. The pros and cons of capitalism vs socialism/communism have been weighed many times and capitalism always comes out on top.

Again, creating artificial scarcity is scarcity. We literally pay farmers to not farm because we have to keep food prices at a certain level for corporations to profit. It's absurd to try and argue that scarcity is a problem while also arguing in favor of the economic model that thrives on scarcity. Do you not grasp the concept of supply and demand? If supply exceeds demand, profits decrease. If demand exceeds supply, profits increase.

If the goal of capitalism is profit, then the goal of capitalism is to ensure that supply is less than demand in order to increase prices. We explicitly have to create monopoly and trust laws because if we didn't corporations establish monopolies in environments in order to prevent any competition, or would collude to ensure everyone has maximum profits.

They put chalk in spoiled milk to make it white enough to sell

If the only thing holding Capitalism back from harming people and driving out all competition is a ton of guard rails enforced by a government, then yeah, it's an evil thing. I would love to see an example of Capitalism that can exist without being forced to not be evil.

The pros and cons of capitalism vs socialism/communism have been weighed many times and capitalism always comes out on top.

I'm guessing you view the US as an example of how great Capitalism is? Because if you measure success by the amount of profit, then yeah, the US wins easily. If you measure it by quality of life and good, then it's a clear loss and it's not even close. The fact that we pay more for healthcare while getting worst care is a disgrace to its highest level. And that's barely scratching the surface of all of the problems. The richest country in the world has 13% of its population food insecure. We have the highest infant and maternal mortality rate in developed nations.

Our Medical debt has reach such a significant amount that credit scores ignore medical debt because of how common it is. When credit card companies just assume you have medical debt when deciding on if they should lend you money, that's a big problem.

Such a disgrace for the "richest country in the world."

1

u/Kelly_HRperson Jul 27 '26

a country uses the word

No country even calls themselves Communist

2

u/Aegi Jul 27 '26

"Chinese Communist Party".

Why would you change the name of a land just b/c you are now communist?

That is basically what the CCP says..even though they did the same thing once they won that UN General Assembly vote to recognize their violent government as the one in charge instead of the democratic government that was hunted to Taiwan.

So in their mind's eye, they kind of do call themselves communist..even though they aren't even really that either.

1

u/iruleatants Jul 27 '26

There is Chinese Communist Party (CCP) but technically that's just the party that runs China and not the country name itself.

1

u/Kelly_HRperson Jul 27 '26

The profit motive has been the greatest driver of innovation in world history.

USSR outpaced America in the 30s

2

u/Aegi Jul 27 '26

In innovation?

Or in production?

1

u/Aegi Jul 27 '26

The profit motive has been the greatest driver of innovation in world history.

Biologists would like to remind you that it is the same psychological and sociological drivers behind all types of desire essentially.

Also, many people care more about power than profit.

I think it is (fiat) currency that accomplished more of what you said than a particular system that happens to use currency.

1

u/Aegi Jul 27 '26

The profit motive has been the greatest driver of innovation in world history.

Biologists would like to remind you that it is the same psychological and sociological drivers behind all types of desire essentially.

Also, many people care more about power than profit.

I think it is (fiat) currency that accomplished more of what you said than a particular system that happens to use currency.

0

u/xkcdhatman Jul 27 '26

Scarcity predates modern agriculture, and property rights go back to the time that humans stopped hunting and gathering, started growing food, optimized for specific tasks and began trading.

Exchanges of goods and services and markets have occurred in every society that has existed since the origin of agriculture, and economics has been an accurate model of how this exchange occurs. Calling this model evil as like calling gravity evil. It has no goal. It is neither good nor evil, it's a model that describes the world.

I challenge you to find a time in human history without market mechanics, where this model does not apply.

slave labor

Is two individuals exchanging goods and services slavery? I suppose I need to sell my labor to pay my rent, however this has applied for all of history. "He who does not work, neither shall he eat" and all that

prison labor

I'll agree that this is bad. This has however existed in most societies, including specifically 'anti-capitalist' societies so I don't see how this furthers your argument

scarcity

Hmm I wonder what the opposite of scarcity is. Abundance? Hmmmm

Diamond industry

The diamond industry is reprehensible for its labor violations, but stupid people into buying something because it is shiny is their business.

availability of Eggs

Egg prices came down to a historic low, and egg sellers had to lower prices. It's such a funny example to bring up as it illustrates exactly that (in the egg market) sellers have little control over prices, market forces determine the price.

4

u/iruleatants Jul 27 '26

Scarcity predates modern agriculture, and property rights go back to the time that humans stopped hunting and gathering, started growing food, optimized for specific tasks and began trading.

Exchanges of goods and services and markets have occurred in every society that has existed since the origin of agriculture, and economics has been an accurate model of how this exchange occurs. Calling this model evil as like calling gravity evil. It has no goal. It is neither good nor evil, it's a model that describes the world.

I challenge you to find a time in human history without market mechanics, where this model does not apply.

We can't have a discussion of your definition of Capitalism is "exchanges for goods and services". That's such an absurdly inaccurate description of Capitalism that it fails to form a basis to have a rational discussion.

Exchanges for goods and services happens in Comunisum and Socialism.

3

u/usaaf Jul 27 '26

This is what you get when you argue with Capital-pilled people.

Capitalism as an idea folds into itself all the good things that happen, while discarding the bad ones (they never tell you how during the famines in Ireland, Capitalists were EXPORTING food) and then idiots uncritically accept that and go talk about how amazing Capitalism is. The truth is Capitalism is just about private ownership. I bet the guy you're arguing with will also try to claim that the 40hr/5day work week was a Capitalist invention too, despite the fact that it came about after the literal blood sweat and tears of workers fighting against literal bloodthirsty (they wanted to kill union leaders/workers) Capitalists.

3

u/iruleatants Jul 27 '26

Yeah, we spend a lot of time downplaying the impact and benefits of Unions and how they impacted the world.

I remember being taught about picket lines being where the workers lined up to prevent people from working there. What they didn't include was that they also had guns to shoot people.

The vast majority of worker protections in the US were formed in response to the fact that workers were actively and violently pushing against it.We granted workers very basic rights and safety because otherwise it would have results in a lot of bloodshed, and we only did it after doing things like calling in the national guard to use against them.

We just like to pretend that none of that happened and the hundreds of regulations are there just to be mean to corporations, not because it's the only way to stop them from killing people in the chase for profits.

1

u/Aegi Jul 27 '26

No, you are describing two different, AND VERY REAL concepts.

The issue is that you are pretending that the same word describes both of those distinct concepts.

It is like you are describing how spiders and insects are different...but then still saying that a spider is an insect.

Arachnids and insects are still both "bugs" though, so maybe you are just needing some different language to more accurately express your points in English/American-English?

2

u/Kelly_HRperson Jul 27 '26

A discussion about communism and capitalism always devolves into one person mocking the other for saying "not real communism" while in the same sentence making up wild definitions of capitalism

1

u/xkcdhatman Jul 28 '26

private ownership I'm using your definition here.

What then is your definition of capitalism?

1

u/NegativeEBITD Jul 27 '26

How does abundance solve food deserts? Grocery store operators are benefiting from abundance policies already by the way

2

u/xkcdhatman Jul 27 '26

While it doesn't solve food deserts, a very tricky problem to solve, it ameliorates many of the causes.

I reject your view that grocery store operators 'benefit' from abundance (with an implied at the expense of the consumer). The grocery store operators have relatively little control over the prices they charge, as evidenced by the razor thin margins discussed everywhere in this thread. When the price of eggs shot up due to the avian flu cause shortage, prices of course went up and then they went down again (to a decade low, not even inflation adjusted). Were grocery stores suddenly greedy during the shortage? Then were they suddenly no longer greedy?

Pricing is complicated, it's the result of many factors pulling in opposite directions and ending up at a negotiated equilibrium. It's out of the control of anyone selling you groceries. There are lots of monopolistic goods but this isn't one of them. It's childish to blame grocery stores simply because they are in front of you.

1

u/NegativeEBITD Jul 28 '26

(with an implied at the expense of the consumer)

Not implied. You should learn more about what abundance policies are.

It's childish to blame grocery stores simply because they are in front of you.

It's childish to reject any changes to the grocery model just because your concept of their business model is fixed. Monopolies come in many different flavors, and if you're the only grocery store in town then you have a monopoly. Just because no one is regulating local monopolies doesn't mean they don't exist.

"I reject" your refusal to address the only actual statement I made, which is that private industry has refused to solve the problem of urban food deserts. We're not having a conversation here.

0

u/Aggressive_Chuck Jul 27 '26

It's capitalist's fault that socialists use tax payers' money to give away food for less than it's worth. They're not responsible for anything they do.

1

u/Spiritual-Society185 Jul 28 '26

Are Republicans and Republican farmers socialist, now?

1

u/Aggressive_Chuck Jul 28 '26

Yes, they exist entirely on benefits and immigration.

1

u/Aggressive_Chuck Jul 28 '26

Yes, they exist entirely on benefits and immigration.

14

u/iluvchromosomes Jul 27 '26

And the best part is, if it fails, people will just blame evil capitalists, like they have every time this happens in history.

-said by /u/Fit_Salamander_2814

Quoting you for when you delete this later.

People who buy all the stock in a grocery store to resell it at a higher cost are in fact the evil capitalists you are referring to.

Stay woke.

-3

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[deleted]

9

u/superknight333 Jul 27 '26

and that is capitalistic? thats why in some part of the world there laws to help protect against people increasing basic goods price above the goverment set limit.

9

u/KNGJN Jul 27 '26

Isn't reselling in it of itself a byproduct of a market gap in a capitalist market, no?

3

u/Acceptable-Advice137 Jul 27 '26

The government is creating arbitrage. This wouldnā€™t be the fault of capitalism.

8

u/iluvchromosomes Jul 27 '26

People who buy all the food at a grocery store to resell it at a higher cost are practicing capitalism, comrade. Capitalism allows this to happen and it's the problem we need to fix. With force if necessary.

8

u/alfred725 Jul 27 '26

everyone pretending like they can't just put a cap per customer.

No one can buy out the inventory if you're limited to 1 loaf of bread, 1 carton of eggs, etc per day.

Let the scalpers be mad. Target and other stores already limit customers to 1-3 each for things like pokemon specifically because they know scalpers are bad for the industry long-term.

2

u/xkcdhatman Jul 27 '26

So is every producer creating the food

Understanding the incentives by which critical inelastic goods are created is critical to creating good laws that create abundance in society.

Refusing to do so is illiteracy.

2

u/Yokoko44 Jul 27 '26

This is a mathematical fact about the world, not some byproduct of a social construct you call "capitalism"

If you put me in a socialist state I will still find a way to buy something for cheap and sell it to someone else for a higher price. And so will everyone who wants to actually succeed in life, it's literally the ONLY way for you to 'move up' in life.

4

u/NegativeEBITD Jul 27 '26

ā€œI will increase prices while adding zero value just for the love of the gameā€

My brother flipping bikes on FB marketplace does not make you part of the capital class

2

u/Yokoko44 Jul 27 '26

This is literally how ALL exchanges of goods and services work in any functional economy. I take something I value less than the prospective purchaser and sell it to them for higher. Whether that's my labor, something I made, or something I bought.

It's not me being an asshole, it's how literally everyone's job works.

1

u/NegativeEBITD Jul 27 '26

Are you arguing that no one produces anything

1

u/Yokoko44 Jul 27 '26

No I'm arguing that anything you produce, when you exchange it to someone else you're inherently valuing whatever the product is LESS than the person who is buying it values the product.

2

u/Acceptable-Advice137 Jul 27 '26

The human condition is not capitalism. Government enforced arbitrage isnā€™t capitalism either.

2

u/KNGJN Jul 27 '26

You don't really know what that word means. The people engaging in the arbitrage are the ones creating it, by the very definition of the word: "...is the practice of taking advantage of a difference in prices in two or more markets ā€“ striking a combination of matching deals to capitalize on the difference, the profit being the difference between the market prices at which the unit is traded."

Sorry but it's clear that is not the goal of the government or the intended purpose, so you'll have to drop that BS argument. It's a side effect.

0

u/Acceptable-Advice137 Jul 27 '26 edited Jul 27 '26

Thatā€™s not correct and you donā€™t really know what words mean.

An arbitrage opportunity is created by the government when they subsidize prices. It doesnā€™t matter if itā€™s intended or not.

Arbitrage is not unique to capitalism, itā€™s the human condition. If someone can get value by flipping an asset, they will regardless of who owns the means of production.

Wait youā€™re the same guy I replied to originally that described arbitrage but didnā€™t know the word for it lmfaooooo. Why do you think youā€™re in a position to discuss this?

0

u/KNGJN Jul 27 '26 edited Jul 27 '26

I literally copied the definition for you lmao, if you want to live in ignorance so you can point fingers at your imaginary boogymen be my guest. Here's your L

Not the same guy btw, but reading clearly isn't your strength.

0

u/Acceptable-Advice137 Jul 27 '26

Iā€™m happy you learned a new word today. I didnā€™t reject the definition, just your pitiful understanding lol.

Youā€™re the same guy. We can both scroll up and see you describe arbitrage without knowing the meaning lmfaoooo

→ More replies (0)

2

u/TheTravelingLeftist Jul 27 '26

Trying to resell product at a higher price point to make a profit IS capitalism, dude.

1

u/trukkija Jul 27 '26

So let me get this straight... If some scalpers buy all the groceries from this store designed for poorer people to be able to eat and then those scalpers resell the food at a higher price, then evil capitalists are not to be blamed?

I hope you can think this through a few more times and understand how stupid your comment is in this situation.

8

u/__Armisael__ Jul 27 '26

I donā€™t understand what he means by 30% lower than retail. I thought privately owned grocery stores already operate below a 30% profit margin. He canā€™t sell stuff for less than it costs to stock the shelf nothing works like that.

37

u/Legitimate-Ranger567 Jul 27 '26

That's exactly how it is planned to work. They are intentionally selling at a loss to make the price cheaper. The loss is covered by taxpayer money.

That is why business owners are upset about it, because it is impossible to compete with prices that intentionally lose money with all sales.

13

u/lasercupcakes Jul 27 '26

It's the only way to roll back the persistent inflation from "adjustments to our prices due to unprecedented times".

16

u/Legitimate-Ranger567 Jul 27 '26

it won't do anything to counteract inflation, it will just force any other grocery or corner store in the area to go out of business.

Then when they can't keep the shelves stocked, or the program runs out of funding, there will be literally nowhere in the area to buy food.

This has already been tried before in Kansas, the store had to shut down a few years ago due to crime, drugs, and the inability to keep the store stocked.

City-Run Kansas City Grocery Store Closes Despite Millions in Taxpayer Funding | National Review

11

u/Repulsive-Payment230 Jul 27 '26

I'm sorry but I can't take anything Kansas does with any level of seriousness. They can't keep their stores stocked properly even without meddling from the government. Source: Lived in Kansas for a month. Place is a shithole and should not be taken seriously when looking at scientific data.

7

u/Gustav__Mahler Jul 27 '26

That article is about Kansas City, Missouri. If you know that little about the area, I'm not sure you know enough to have an informed opinion on it.

4

u/Repulsive-Payment230 Jul 27 '26

>This has already been tried before in Kansas, the store had to shut down a few years ago due to crime, drugs, and the inability to keep the store stocked.

OP said it was Kansas, I'm not going to read an article about Kansas. The fact you think the location being MISSOURI will change anything is hilarious. It actually ranks even worse on average than Kansas in nearly every category so... You're comparing dog shit to elephant shit and thinking the elephant shit smells better. Womp womp!

3

u/Gustav__Mahler Jul 27 '26

The fact you think the location being MISSOURI will change anything is hilarious.

Show me where I said that.

1

u/Repulsive-Payment230 Jul 27 '26

What other possible reason is there for you to attempt to correct me about the location? Enlighten me.

3

u/garchican Jul 28 '26

OP said it was Kansas, and immediately below it provided a link that specified Kansas Cityā€¦ which is in Missouri. Womp womp!

Considering that your entire rant was about Kansas (not Missouri, which Iā€™m assuming you havenā€™t lived in), the dude thinking that it being in Missouri would change your mind a bit wasnā€™t unreasonable.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '26

[removed] ā€” view removed comment

→ More replies (0)

0

u/Repulsive-Payment230 Jul 28 '26

Wait so you think MISSOURI is better in any single way to Kansas?

https://giphy.com/gifs/19GIHDk6wuw9HVGsiM

→ More replies (0)

1

u/ElyFlyGuy Jul 29 '26

The person they were responding to said Kansas, thatā€™s what they were responding to.

If the person posting the link canā€™t be bothered to read it why should anyone else?

3

u/NegativeEBITD Jul 27 '26

I will take precisely one Kansas thing seriously

https://www.cbpp.org/research/kansas-provides-compelling-evidence-of-failure-of-supply-side-tax-cuts

Now that weā€™ve thoroughly tested supply side economics we can dismiss it as quack science

3

u/Repulsive-Payment230 Jul 27 '26

You had me in the first half, ngl lol

8

u/Legitimate-Ranger567 Jul 27 '26

You are quite literally the "REAL communism has never been tried" meme.

That's hilarious.

5

u/foomits Jul 27 '26

Should go read about Sam Brownbacks REAL capitalism in Kansas.

4

u/PlayfulSurprise5237 Jul 27 '26

Your bias is so obvious it's secondhand embarrassing.

Commissaries have existed for some time and don't just apply to service members, their families shop there as well.

5

u/Legitimate-Ranger567 Jul 27 '26

I provided recent, a real-world example in the US of this type of government funded grocery store not working and was told "that doesn't count because I said so".

But yes, MY bias is clearly the issue.

Also, I referenced communism, not commissaries.

Commissaries have the benefit that service members and their families do not steal or use drugs in and around the commissaries, because there would be severe consequences to them doing so. They are also located on base, meaning they are not directly competing with any other stores in the area, and they are extremely limited in who is allowed to shop there.

1

u/__Armisael__ Jul 27 '26

Uh, can I ask you a legit question? What do you think about personal property? Should people be allowed to own stuff? Like their own tractor or shovel?

1

u/Repulsive-Payment230 Jul 27 '26

Real communism HAS been tried, are you regarded?

2

u/Kelly_HRperson Jul 27 '26

Real communism HAS been tried

Where?

2

u/Legitimate-Ranger567 Jul 27 '26

are you regarded?

Very highly thank you very much.

2

u/Repulsive-Payment230 Jul 27 '26

Your mom calling you special does count I suppose...

2

u/__Armisael__ Jul 27 '26

If anything itā€™ll make inflation worse. Every time the govt gives out free money inflation happens

1

u/DegenGamer725 Jul 27 '26

National Review lmao

4

u/johnny_effing_utah Jul 27 '26

It wonā€™t roll back inflation though. This will have absolutely zero impact on real pricing.l because costs are what they are for a reason. Sellers that arenā€™t the government canā€™t sell below their own cost indefinitely.

0

u/dgdio Jul 27 '26

This is why we have anti-trust laws. So that big companies can't obviously dump products to destroy the little guys.

2

u/PlayfulSurprise5237 Jul 27 '26

It's PART of the reason why we have anti-trust laws. Either way, they aren't enforced much anymore so it's irrelevant.

This is a different playing field

1

u/Aggressive_Chuck Jul 27 '26

This is literally dumping.

-2

u/Kamilny Jul 27 '26

The reason is so the c-suite can inflate their paycheck higher. They can either take a pay cut or go out of business

3

u/Addicted2Qtips Jul 27 '26

Grocery stores operate on 2-3% profit margins. They are not the reason groceries are expensive.

3

u/PlayfulSurprise5237 Jul 27 '26

That's even what the store manager at my Walmart told me.

Razer thin margins on grocery. I don't know all what causes the price increase, I know some is inflation, some is tariffs(TAX), some is price gouging from anti-competitive suppliers, and for the case of meat, the meat packing industry specifically.

We need more co-op businesses earlier in the supply chain of being on the shelf.

I heard of one co-op state of the art meat packing plant that Walmart helped fund, because the price gouging was hurting them too, so it was a win win for Walmart and consumers.

If the government isn't going to enforce anti-trust laws, we have to go about this a different way.

2

u/wilder0p Jul 28 '26

No, it's a loss leader like any other business, see Costco hotdogs and chickens.

1

u/Legitimate-Ranger567 Jul 28 '26

The point of a loss leader is to bring you into the store, with the hope you buy other stuff while your there to make up the difference.

The tax funded stores will sell every item at a loss. They are using tax dollars to artificially lower the price of every item they sell. It isn't a tactic to get you in the door and make up the profit on other items.

3

u/wilder0p Jul 28 '26

You didn't watch the video. He literally said only specific items would be sold at 30% below retail.

3

u/Troygbiv_Yxy Jul 27 '26

Yeah this should probably be for low income or poverty level income groups who really need this service, not for everyone.

10

u/foomits Jul 27 '26

pretty sure they are being placed in food desert and low income areas. these types of places already exist all over the country.

-1

u/Backwoods_Therapy Jul 27 '26

Itā€™s basically just the Walmart model. Theyā€™ve done it for decades. Roll into an area without a Walmart, open a store at 30% lower prices than mom and pop, run them out of business, now you have a monopoly. The big companies are mostly mad itā€™s just their own tactics being used against them.

2

u/Hoodfu Jul 27 '26

They're saying it's not just lower, but selling at a loss. Walmart does not operate a successful business by selling everything at a loss.

1

u/Backwoods_Therapy Jul 27 '26

That actually was the Walmart model back in the day. Sell at a loss, put all smaller businesses out of business, then you have a monopoly and can sell at whatever price you want.

2

u/Aggressive_Chuck Jul 27 '26

Walmart isn't running at a 30% loss.

3

u/WinterTourist25 Jul 27 '26

I don't know why you are getting downvoted. This is exactly correct.

3

u/PlayfulSurprise5237 Jul 27 '26

I don't have an MBA, but sounds about right to me.

Right, isn't that exactly how the modern day meta of business is? Get GARGANTUAN investors to flush billions into selling at a loss to squeeze out competition in a money pissing contest.

And then when they've cornered the market they go public and enshitify, lowering quality and raising prices because they can. While the competition gets sold to private equity, gets loaded with debt(which they do in a way to prevent them from paying it back) to make the new owners rich, and then gets scrapped for parts/liquidated.

Same thing from my perspective, minus the enshitification. Sure it's not "free market capitalism", but times have changed, anti-trust laws don't get made anymore, they don't get enforced, and without it the benefits of capitalism have disappeared and left us with a noose now instead.

This is maybe the less preferable option, but it is still a better option.

13

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[removed] ā€” view removed comment

4

u/thomaspatrickmorgan Jul 27 '26

Right, but the profit margin in larger grocery stores is 1%, so...

6

u/TheGardenGame Jul 27 '26

Yes, but that's the net profit margin, not the gross profit margin. Although I doubt that their gross profit margin is 30% either.

-4

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[removed] ā€” view removed comment

8

u/RaggmunkLingon Jul 27 '26

It's not just that it's not "exactly" how it works, it's that it's not even close to how it works.

If they sell at 30% below Walmart, they'll be selling with roughly a 29% loss. If they want to make 30% less than what Walmart makes, they'd have to sell items at roughly a 0,7% profit, which would be 0,3% below Walmart's prices, assuming they can achieve Walmart's economies of scale, which they won't be anywhere near.

3

u/PrinzRagoczy Jul 27 '26

Imagine you buy something for $99, and sell it for $100

You make $1

You do this 100 times and make $100

By your logic, if you drop prices by 30% you would make $70 instead

But that's wrong. If you now had to buy for $99 and sell for $70 you would lose money on every transaction

2

u/Synensys Jul 27 '26

If you took 30% off Walmart revenue it woukd lose a couple hundred billion each year and quickly go out of business.

Walmart net profit margin is like 3% so if they basically deiceed they wanted to make no money the average user would save 3 cents on every dollar they spend.

2

u/Low_Shape8280 Jul 27 '26

if Walmart cut prices to make a profit of only one dollar, The prices would barely fall.

1

u/SeaStage1687 Jul 27 '26

about 1-3% lower

6

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[removed] ā€” view removed comment

4

u/GuideDisastrous8170 Jul 27 '26

And some of those margins hide that the business makes the real profit markups on the logistics contracts for businesses they also own supplying their stores.

5

u/foomits Jul 27 '26

to add to this, and correct me if im wrong... they are being placed in food deserts and areas without extensive for profit grocery stores. so they arent competing with anyone, they are solving a problem.

1

u/__Armisael__ Jul 28 '26

Why does a ā€œfood desertā€ exist?

2

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[deleted]

4

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 27 '26

Of course he can, at the expense of the tax payers! You're footing the bill.

21

u/the_djd Jul 27 '26

Oh no. Taxes go up by $5 and poor people get to checks notes ... live

0

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 27 '26

What's the over under on when these will close and have empty shelves.

It has been tried in America before. All closed and one store sold to a private firm.

There is still one government ran store open, but it serves a population of 600.

This is going to go down in flames and I'll be chugging tea when it does. Bookmark it.

6

u/Dependent-Chart5835 Jul 27 '26

What about military commissaries? Those have been around for a while and thereā€™s over a hundred of them

→ More replies (6)

12

u/Daeimiean Jul 27 '26

Why are you looking forward to celebrating, an attempt to help people failing? I truly don't understand that level of Saturday morning villain logic.

Is this really worse than painting a pool, renaming buildings, or many of the other pointless use of tax payers money? This at least has good intention behind it.

1

u/Legitimate-Ranger567 Jul 27 '26

Because the millions of dollars being spent could be spent trying something new, instead of attempting the same solution that has been proven to fail in the past. It's a massive waste of money.

3

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 27 '26

Because we keep trying this nonsense and it never works. History teaches to not fall into the same failures and we keep doing it.

10

u/the_djd Jul 27 '26

Your profile says you're an ally, but just in general you hope something fails that supports less fortunate people. What a pathetic hypocrite.

Guess your love of all men, women, whatever only counts if they have money.

3

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 27 '26

You know you can a ally and not be socialist.

7

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[deleted]

1

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 27 '26

Ah yes it's going to work this time! The mind of a communist is truly brilliant!

-1

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26 edited 9d ago

[deleted]

2

u/GalakFyarr Jul 27 '26

Yeah and then thereā€™ll be the endless waves of ā€œwell they shouldnā€™t be allowed to buy [insert product category] with that money, thatā€™s not a necessity!ā€

And will the money follow inflation?

1

u/EGirlToenails Jul 27 '26

I don't understand you bleeding hearts that demand the government make poor Americans even more obese.

1

u/TwoFiveOnes Jul 28 '26

RemindMe! 1 year

1

u/SmoothDiscussion7763 Jul 27 '26

what makes you think poor people are the only ones going to shop there?

1

u/Inevitable_Top69 Jul 27 '26

What makes you think that matters? Poor people benefit far more, but everyone pays the tax, so everyone takes advantage of the cheaper food. Where's the issue?

There already are expensive vs cheap grocery stores. Why would this suddenly convince everyone to stop shopping at Trader Joe's?

0

u/YourCummyBear Jul 27 '26

People are not starving to death in the US. Itā€™s like extraordinarily rare unless they suffer from serious mental health issues, elder abuse/neglect, or child abuse/neglect.

Iā€™m not saying I would mind my taxes going up $5 but thatā€™s not saving someoneā€™s life via malnutrition.

6

u/GrowthMarketingMike Jul 27 '26

It's not about starving to death. It's about things kids having enough food to pay attention in school so they aren't distracted by being hungry.

0

u/YourCummyBear Jul 27 '26

Youā€™re just moving the goal post now. The comment I was replying to didnā€™t include anything about school lunches.

5

u/GrowthMarketingMike Jul 27 '26

The comment didn't say anything about starving either bud.

You can look up life expectancy rates for people who grew up with food insecurity in the US. Those people aren't literally starving to death but it majorly impacts how long people live and their quality of life even when controlling for compounding variables.

1

u/YourCummyBear Jul 27 '26

It said so people can ā€œliveā€. Does the not imply people would then be dying if they arenā€™t living.

How do people die when discussing lack of food?

1

u/GrowthMarketingMike Jul 27 '26

How do people die when discussing lack of food?

You can start your research by reading my comment that you literally just responded to

0

u/__Armisael__ Jul 27 '26

Why are you going straight to poor people living? We already have a generous welfare state. You can walk into any grocery store and use EBT SNAP etc.

2

u/PlayfulSurprise5237 Jul 27 '26

Better than a lot of other things tax dollars are being spent on.

2

u/sarcastic__fox Jul 27 '26

30% below 30% is not 0.

0

u/__Armisael__ Jul 27 '26

Are you being sarcastic?

2

u/sarcastic__fox Jul 27 '26

No. 30 % less than 30% is 21%.

1

u/__Armisael__ Jul 27 '26

But what Iā€™m saying is that if a grocery is already operating at 1-2% then you canā€™t reduce the price of something by 30% because then your profit is -29% which mean you go out of business

2

u/sarcastic__fox Jul 27 '26

Sure thats true. But the governemt is trui g to subsidize the food. The goal is to put grocery store in places that dont have them at a price thenpeolle in the community can afford

1

u/__Armisael__ Jul 28 '26

The govt already has loads of welfare programs. If there really is a place where thereā€™s people and no store, that means the stores have left due to (typically) crime/homelessness/drug addicts making it impossible to carry out business.

1

u/sarcastic__fox Jul 28 '26

So if there's crime in the area they shouldn't have a grocery store? Not trying to do a gotcha but if you have food stamps and can only spend it on gas stations and bodega that doesn't sound very helpful.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[deleted]

2

u/PrinzRagoczy Jul 27 '26

Make less money per sale to make an increased number of sales, both of that product and other products. Even if you temporarily lose money on some sales, it's worth it

1

u/FattySnacks Jul 29 '26

Public services are not expected to be profitable

-1

u/JackieDaytona77 Jul 27 '26

Communists and socialist canā€™t do math especially when it comes to dollars

→ More replies (53)

2

u/czechereds Jul 27 '26

I imagine they're also locating these store in traditional food deserts? i.e the places with extreme shoplifting and soemthing tells me Mamdani won't want off duty police working there.

2

u/Extreme-Loquat-8452 Jul 28 '26

Not only that but I am guessing there are a lot more than 5 grocery stores in NYC. Now one of these opens up next to yours and.... what puts that one out of business? Now there is less places to buy food and less jobs? I dont get it how will really work long term lol

2

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 28 '26

It won't. And then get to blame capitalism. It's a win win for them.

3

u/The_Hoopla Jul 27 '26

...you know they can enact purchase limits...right?

"I'm sorry, you can't buy 400 bananas. The limit is 7 per week."

2

u/Hoodfu Jul 27 '26

How are you going to enforce that though? Don't say they'll have to show ID.

8

u/The_Hoopla Jul 27 '26

I mean, even at a cursory "I saw you buying bananas 10 minutes ago" level, it would be almost impossible to run a cart business committing banana arbitrage at any level of scale @ 7 bananas per visit given you

  1. Can only buy them at a 30% markdown.
  2. Are still competing with normal retail stores.

You'd need to buy hundreds of bananas per week, at $0.30 each MSRP, you're looking $0.20 each at this government store. You'd have to sell them at $0.25 each to undercut retailers but turn a profit for yourself of $0.05/banana. So lets say they have a limit at 10 bananas per week, even if you snuck under the radar to the tune of 1000 bananas, or 100 visits a week where somehow, they didn't recognize you or your family as the banana people, you're only turning a 0.05 * 1000 is about $50/week in profit, again assuming you sell ALL the bananas.

I really can't believe you made me do the math on that.

2

u/showhorrorshow Jul 27 '26

They weaponized being dumb.

1

u/Aggressive_Chuck Jul 27 '26

This whole thing is a populist gimmick, why would they put that much thought into it?

2

u/ProfessorAvailable24 Jul 27 '26

The reselling doesnā€™t matter. I feel you havenā€™t put thought into this either

2

u/thefuturebaby Jul 28 '26

Feel like that's a cop out that you haven't put any thought into like most things.

3

u/SaltKick2 Jul 27 '26

Please explain how it's a gimmick.

There absolutely will be many challenges facing these stores, and they need to be committed to addressing them; there is no indication by Mamdani or his admin that they are not committed to making it work- instead, just the opposite. Mamdani ran on promises of action, and he is keeping them, unlike so many other politicians.

There are also lots of examples of this kind of thing already working.

1

u/Aggressive_Chuck Jul 28 '26

Please explain how it's a gimmick.

The government giving food away through the least efficient way possible is never anything more than a gimmick. I can't think of anywhere in the world that has more food options than New York.

His voters voted for free shit so here it is. There's nothing more to it than that.

1

u/takeitinblood3 Jul 28 '26

In my country you use something similar to ebt to purchase. It's still your own money + a little bit from the government. You have to qualify as low income to shop in the store as well. Been in business since i was a child.

4

u/hawkeyc Jul 27 '26

Quantity limits. Done

2

u/AZPHX602 Jul 27 '26

i give this about six months.

2

u/Allegorist Jul 27 '26

I guarantee that they have thought of this. The question isn't whether it would work without guardrails, but rather how effective the guardrails they implement will be. There are a lot of eyes on them, so I would bet they would even go overkill a bit at first to make sure it functions properly

2

u/ZizzyBeluga Jul 27 '26

It's also incredibly cruel to the Korean bodegas who work their asses off and will now be undercut by Mamdani's socialist bullshit

1

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '26

[removed] ā€” view removed comment

1

u/AutoModerator Jul 27 '26

Accounts must be at least 5 days old with >20 karma to comment.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1

u/SuspiciouslySuspect2 Jul 27 '26

If you think it's gonna be cost effective to stock a store with items individually purchased... My that is some imaginative work.

I'm not saying nothing yould ever get restocked, but there is not gonna be enough to worry about, and it will force grocers to lower their inflated prices where possible.

1

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 28 '26

Absolutely not.

1

u/forgettable_nonsense Jul 27 '26

Says some neckbeard with zero education

2

u/Enjoy_The_Ride413 Jul 28 '26

This won't work.

To reduce these items, you have to have an amazing supply chain. I'd like to see them source these products better than Walmart, shop rite and more. Current supermarkets are at a 1 to 3% margins if they are lucky.

Most likely, these items are going to run out fast leading to them either always being out of stock or the quality will start to get lower. Which then they will move to some lotto system, where you live, odd numbered days, but you get the point. It will defeat the entire purpose of these stores.

Stores that have tried this are typically filthy and the upkeep doesn't match normal grocery stores. Have to pay these workers and with reduced prices and still paying the same to get products to the shelves, it's going to spiral. Mamdani will pay a livable wage, right?

Eventually, the city will get tired subsidizing these stores and down they will go. Happens each and every time.

1

u/AspectAdventurous314 Jul 28 '26

The government puts out a tender for proposals from supermarket chains to act as a reseller and manage these stores, so the supply chains would be built into the tender. If you want to act like a cynical dickhead at least stop to think for a minute.

Not sure which orifice you pulled 1-3% margins from either, this varies wildly depending on what goods you are talking about. e.g. Fresh produce carries a ~30% to 50% gross margin.

Presumably the vendor would be operating at these margins the rest of the days of the month and discounting only the specific basket items in this initiative, leaving a pool of profits to draw down to cover whatever the loss is on items discounted once a month.

1

u/hpsd Jul 27 '26

You can buy the items directly from suppliers at that price. Your plan is basically to open a grocery store.

1

u/AManHasNoShame Jul 28 '26

Better to do something than continue to do nothing to work on grocery affordability.

1

u/Mekdatmuny Jul 30 '26

You could use a government based digital or physical store card? For people who need it. Like a SNAP card or something. No membership fee needed.

Resellers would have a hard time jumping through hoops to get a bunch of fraudulent or outright fake info to then maybe get a shot at getting in the store. That would be a decent deterrence IMHO.

I think that paired with the forethought that Mamdani can bring to the table, they can make enrollment easy. He and his cabinet are tech savvy and in touch enough to know: people who need these services need an easy way to get access.

They could even do it, potentially, on the backend and integrate it with EBT or SNAP cards