This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
Warren Buffett Is Everything That's Wrong With America
From Bloomberg: Kraft a Menu at the Buffett Buffet With Warren’s Latest Deal
* * *
I think I’ve never understood the American – and international – fascination with money, with gathering wealth as the no. 1 priority in one’s life. What looks even stranger to me is the idolization of people who have a lot of money. Like these people are per definition smarter or better than others. It seems obvious that most of them are probably just more ruthless, that they have less scruples, and that their conscience is less likely to get in the way of their money and power goals.
America may idolize no-one more than Warren Buffett, the man who has propelled his fund, Berkshire Hathaway, into riches once deemed unimaginable. For most people, Buffett symbolizes what is great about American society and its economic system. For me, he’s the symbol of everything that’s going wrong.
Last week, Buffett announced a plan to merge a number of ‘food’ companies in a deal he set up with Brazilian 3G Capital. For some reason, they all have German names (I’m not sure why that is or what it means, if anything): Heinz, Kraft, Oscar Mayer. Reuters last week summed up a few of the ‘foods’ involved:
His move on Wednesday to inject Velveeta cheese, Jell-O, Lunchables, Oscar Mayer wieners, and Kool-Aid into his portfolio, stuffs an already amply supplied larder. The additions came from the acquisition of Kraft Foods Group Inc by H.J. Heinz Co, which is controlled by 3G Capital and Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway. His larder already included everything from Burger King’s Triple Whopper burgers, Coca-Cola soft drinks and Tim Horton donuts to See’s Candies and Dairy Queen icecream Blizzards, as well as such Heinz brands as Tomato Ketchup, Ore-Ida fries, bagel bites and T.G.I. Friday’s mozzarella sticks.
Isn’t it curious to see that once people have more than enough to eat, they sort of make up for that by drastically lowering the quality of their food, like there’s some sort of balance that needs to be found? Give them more than plenty, and they’ll start using it to poison themselves.
The key term here, the one that tells you where this goes awry, is what in economics is called ‘externalities’. Something large industries are very good at circumventing. The larger the are, the better they get at it. Mostly this has to do with environmental destruction as a result of resource extraction, but the razing of large swaths of natural habitat for the construction of highways and suburbs that make people use more products provided by the oil industry, is a good example too. That and the direct effect these products have on people’s physical health.
Buffett, the supposed genius, can only do these deals because nobody demands anybody to pay for the externalities that arise as a result of Warren pushing crap posing as food upon the American people. And then when he’s done getting even richer off of poisoning your kids, he’ll donate billions to their well-being.
But in a better and wiser world, Warren should pay into the health care system right now, he should pay for the obesity and diabetes costs his ventures and investments are going to cause. And he should do so in advance, not just after the fact in some warped and distorted kind of philanthropy. Warren Buffett kills American kids for profit. Huge profits.
The ballooning waistlines of America can be traced back, in a very simple and straight line, to the sorts of ‘food’ that Buffett’s new conglomerate produces. That’s where type 2 diabetes comes from. This is not some vague future scare scenario, it’s here and it’s now. As someone in a poor black community said a few years back: ‘we’re raising a generation of blind amputees’.
And it’s of course not just Buffett, the poisoning and degradation of America’s food runs across and through industries, both vertically and horizontally. The insanity of corn syrup and processed food ranges from Monsanto to Cargill to McDo’s to a zillion other companies and products. Who, as an industry, have managed to keep any responsibility, let alone litigation, at bay.
Who would even dream of taking McDonald’s to court for poisoning American kids? In the present set-up, it would be an impossible and unwinnable case. But that’s not because the accusation is absurd or even far-fetched. It’s because the narrative is that, even if it could be proven, people still have the right to choose to eat what they want.
The companies get the profits, society at large gets the damage. It’s the ultimate form of the Tragedy of the Commons. If you allow people – and companies – to dump the negative consequences, and the costs, of their undertakings on the public, they will, and they can get very rich off of that.
Yeah, Warren has Coke and Utz Potato Stix for breakfast. What a great story… But does that mean he is too thick to understand what happens in America? Does he not see the bulging waistlines? Or is his own bottom line simply that much more important? Does Warren Buffett consider his own profits way more important than the future of America’s children?
You could be forgiven for thinking so, couldn’t you? Warren Buffett is revered all over the place, but in reality, he’s the schoolbook example of everything that’s wrong with America. That whole money before and over anything else (including people’s health and well-being) mentality.
It makes people stupid, and it makes for stupid people. And sick ones, too. It’s their own choice, though, and their own responsibility, advocates of the model will say. All the industry does is help them make that choice by bombarding them with endless feel-good ads. But is that really a good idea if and when it means the world’s health care systems threaten to implode because of it?
Like many other industries, Buffett’s crap-for-food enterprise would not nearly be as profitable (probably not even viable) if it were to be charged for the damage it does to society and the people living in it. That’s what’s wrong with the current American economic model, and Warren epitomizes this.
This Tragedy of the Commons abuse is so ingrained in the economy that it’s hard to see how it can be changed. And that does not bode well for anyone except the Warren Buffetts profiteering from it.
* * *
And then there's this: The mobile-home trap: How a Warren Buffett empire preys on the poor
»
- 55913 reads
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -
No, I think he has it quite right.
Another example back a few years ago was Gordon Gekko's "Greed is Good".
EVERY motive we have been conditioned to is "Is there a Profit in it, Does it make money?"
It isn't "Is it a good idea?"
That underlying current is what creates the Monsanto's and Jamie Dimon's etc. Look at the picture of the Squid again...
' What’s worth doing is worth doing for money. ' - Gordon Gekko
Another great article by Ilargi and AutomaticEarth, Thanks Tylers. One of the best break downs of "Externalities" I think was done by another great writer,
John Michael Greer.
The Externality Trap, or, How Progress Commits Suicide
http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-externality-trap-or-h...
Probably not the "healthiest option" to be eating bacon, deep-fried grated potato ("Tater-Tots" - had to look that up!!), and doughnuts for breakfast!! At 650 KCals that's already heading to 1/3rd of the adult male calorie RDA (which assumes a "moderately active lifestyle" too!).
Note too that the "Obligatory Cherry Cola" has been omitted from the calculations!! :-)
It's easy to blame those who eat the crap, but the problem is that the crap is all over the place. Most everything is loaded with crap you don't even know is in there. And the conglomerates are taking over "organic" food as well, so I'm not so naive to believe there will be no Roundup in those and who knows what else before too long.
Well, you can blame people for eating this crap food all you want, but in a sane world it would be illegal to produce and sell many convenience food ingredients--and even many non-fast-food ingredients--or at least to sell them as food or put them in food. We've had a whole slew of substitutions and additions to our food supply, beginning really since before 1900, but really taking off since about 1950. These substitutions and additions went unexamined for health effects and many have since been shown to be detrimental. HFCS is one example, but I suppose many here are aware that pretty much all wheat grown since about 1950 in the US is a strain that has a higher glycemic index than table sugar. (So baking your own bread probably won't allow you to evade the degradation of wheat itself.) Thanks to modern plant-breeding and poor agricultural practices, fruits and vegetables now have a far lower nutritional content than they did in 1950, along with more pesticide residues. Many common cooking oils are "industrial oils" never before in human history consumed as foods. Food additives such as flavor enhancers and preservatives are, for all practical purposes, untested. Does your stomach revolt after eating store-bought crackers? Guess why.
You could solve a lot of the health problems associated with conveniece foods and modern foods in general by not allowing the poisoning of the food supply with non-food chemicals, and not permitting the sale of non-traditional products as "food." A sane people would not allow the general food supply to be poisoned. If it were made illegal to poison the food supply, that alone would probably mark the end of both the fast-food industry and corporate farming.
FUCK THIS SHIT and those who are defending buffet.
He fucking trades BIG TIME on inside info --- he met with Obama multiple times before making various deals on banks and railways.
HE IS A RODENT.
But of course he is only playing the hand that is given to him --- EVERY SINGLE ONE OF US would do EXACTLY THE SAME if we could
The 90% have been milked and sucked almost dry now. Time for big giants to eat small giants THEN something might change.
I don't like Buffet, but what type of commie bullshit is this?
In my home language, "buffet" is very close to "bufa", wich means: smelly and humid fart. I cannot thing of a mora accurate comparison. Slime and Stink.. that's "bufa" the billionaire fart...
Buffet's ridiculous statements on CNBC regarding gold prove he is nothing more than a shill, a liar and an ass-clown for the real powers behind the scenes - the Rothschilds and their ilk . . . .
After Buffet bought Heinz, I noticed the ketchup was runny...I used to have to pound those bottles to get the stuff out...now I have to shake it to mix the water or I get a soggy hamburger.
Dairy Queen products have been turned into white corn syrup...there's so much sweetener in it now, it's crap. I used to love DQ but stopped going there.
My point...When Buffet buys companies...the products become cheap shit. I'd be ashamed of myself giving that toad my money, so I don't.
Call me green, call me envious, OK. Got that out of the way. The fact is, Warren Buffet has done nothing constructive in his entire useless life. No prductive work. He has not produced a single hamburger, gallon of oil, iPod, car, medicine etc. All he has done is essentially by being so God Damn "aw shucks" clever and full of himself as an investor, is to take money from one group of persons, and put it into his own pocket and his shareholders, while at the same time, no doub,t having access to inside information and being able to shelter his money through tax loopholes.
Go fuck your self Warren and all you hedge fund managers like Romney et al whom the middle clas supports in grand style.
not to self: Avoid DQ at all costs, add it to the list, micky d's, sonic etc. less you like plastic chicken nuggets
I always thought the, at one time, very popular business book "Who moved my (Kraft?) Cheese?" was a classic example of what is wrong with America. The book bassically says, act like mice. If some cheese they found gets moved.... they do not ponder why.......they just go look for more cheese! People tho, should be a little smarter than the mice. Thye should look at changes, and anticipate where the cheese is going.....and then go there and get their cheese. They should not worry about what the change is....just follow the cheese. So, government brings back slavery? Well.... that's gonna create some cheese; go get it! Lead back in paint? Cheese baby..........go! DDT back? Cheesefest....get some. In other words.......get money, all you can, anyway you can, so you too can be the head Rat, err, mouse.
How interesting to observe the even split in the comments between "blame the consumer" and "blame the supplier".
In the current Corporatocracy in which we live, I tend to lean more towards blaming the greater power: MegaCorpGov, a power that feels responsibility only to its shareholders, not to humanity.
If you want to blame the fatties then fine, I regularly do the same when I see a 300lb heffer sucking down a Coke, but could you elaborate on how you generally feel about the legal concept of Duty of Care: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duty_of_care
If a product is desired by consumers, but is known to cause harm to consumers, then who bears responsibility for that harm? At what point should the legal system start to prosecute suppliers?
Where do YOU choose to draw lines within the Food Industrial Complex?
Add this to the reading files about Warren Buffet...from the Center for Public Integrity...so if you already have a sub prime car loan and you happen to have a Buffet mobile home loans...well...it's not good I don't think
Warren Buffett's mobile home empire preys on the poorhttp://www.publicintegrity.org/2015/04/03/17024/warren-buffetts-mobile-home-empire-preys-poor
"Buffett’s mobile home empire promises low-income Americans the dream of homeownership. But Clayton relies on predatory sales practices, exorbitant fees, and interest rates that can exceed 15 percent, trapping many buyers in loans they can’t afford and in homes that are almost impossible to sell or refinance, an investigation by The Center for Public Integrity and The Seattle Times has found."