So tomatoes are being plowed under, and John Deere is laying off thousands of Americans

If we want to blame this on illegal aliens, does that mean the illegal aliens are not buying enough tractors? Have you ever heard of an illegal alien buying a tractor? The price of a new John Deere is somewhere between $100k and a million. These illegal aliens are doing well.

John Deere is lying a lot, so I am less sure of their explanation. They were saying that it was a lie they were laying anyone off, and then they did. They are hiring like crazy in Mexico, so it does not sound like declining sales to me.

My theory is John Deere has looked at the math and figured that it is cheaper to import the tractors once into the USA, or export them to a third country from Mexico, then it is to pay high tariffs to import inputs into the USA, and then more high tariffs if they need to export it.
Um...

"My theory is John Deere has looked at the math and figured that it is cheaper to import the tractors once into the USA, or export them to a third country from Mexico, ***then*** it is to pay high tariffs to import inputs into the USA, and then more high tariffs if they need to export it." (asterisks are mine)

It should be "cheaper than..."

De nada.
 
You are really holding on to that UberEats thing.

I really do not know what it would be like to work for UberEats. I would not mind working out of my car, but I would be worried that the pay would not pay enough to offset the costs of the car. I do not know this to be true, but I always feel that some of the gig jobs pay less than they cost to do. I might spend 25 cents of gasoline to get 20 cents of pay.

When I was younger, I turned down tipped work with Peter Gatien, which would have paid me far more than the work I got. That was back when Gatien owned The Limelight, and Club USA in NYC back in the 1990's. I was worried that the tips were not going to be real, and would rather guaranteed pay.
"You can always tell a MAGAt, but you can't tell them much".

They get pissed at being called White Nationalists, neo-Nazis, authoritarians and anti-Constitutionalists even though it's clear that's exactly what they are by their actions. In response, they call everyone to the left of them communists, marxist and things like underemployed Uber drivers.
 
So John Deere is lying?
They do seem to be lying. They kept saying they were laying off no one, and then they laid off thousands. They even claimed they were doing the opposite.

You did say lying off workers...
No, I said they were lying about laying off workers. I just rechecked what I said, and I said it correctly.

Well, then people are better off working for someone else...
A lot of the John Deere plants are in small town America. This is going to devastate the local economies. With the high homeownership in such communities, it is difficult for these people to move. This is not a good time to try to find a new job.

It's not the John Deere of old, is it?
These few years are going to change everyone. We will all do things we could not have imagined before this.

John Deere is caught in a difficult trap. I would have handled it differently, but I also do not feel I can judge them too harshly. If they announce layoffs, trump will attack them even worse.
 
"You can always tell a MAGAt, but you can't tell them much".

They get pissed at being called White Nationalists, neo-Nazis, authoritarians and anti-Constitutionalists even though it's clear that's exactly what they are by their actions. In response, they call everyone to the left of them communists, marxist and things like underemployed Uber drivers.
The combination superiority and victimhood of the fascists/neo-fascists always seems strange to me.
 
The combination superiority and victimhood of the fascists/neo-fascists always seems strange to me.
It's because they are weak, stupid and too cowardly to stand on their own. They need both a gang and a Daddy to back them up. This is why they often use phrases like "We know" and "our people" to bolster their courage.
 
They do seem to be lying. They kept saying they were laying off no one, and then they laid off thousands. They even claimed they were doing the opposite.


No, I said they were lying about laying off workers. I just rechecked what I said, and I said it correctly.


A lot of the John Deere plants are in small town America. This is going to devastate the local economies. With the high homeownership in such communities, it is difficult for these people to move. This is not a good time to try to find a new job.


These few years are going to change everyone. We will all do things we could not have imagined before this.

John Deere is caught in a difficult trap. I would have handled it differently, but I also do not feel I can judge them too harshly. If they announce layoffs, trump will attack them even worse.
My error...Trumpet said "lying off workers"...
John Deere has issues...it's up to them to resolve the problems within their company...
It's a shame if people lost jobs because of their poor management and policies...
 
Violates every principle of economics. Pay the price and someone will do the work.
Principle of economics - A business that pays more in labor than they can sell their product for goes out of business.
Principle of economics - If supply goes down but demand stays the same then prices go up. (Food is a need.)
Principle of economics - If domestic production costs go up three things are likely to happen, supply goes down, price goes up, foreign products replace domestic products.
 
John Deere has issues...
We all have issues, and we are all getting worse and worse issues as time goes on. John Deere did not cause this disaster. I do not agree with their solutions, I would be more confrontational with trump, but I cannot blame them for this disaster.

It's a shame if people lost jobs because of their poor management and policies...
That we can agree on. We disagree with who is causing all this poor management and policy, but we can agree it is a shame that so many people are going to lose their jobs over the next few years though no fault of their own.
 
We all have issues, and we are all getting worse and worse issues as time goes on. John Deere did not cause this disaster. I do not agree with their solutions, I would be more confrontational with trump, but I cannot blame them for this disaster.


That we can agree on. We disagree with who is causing all this poor management and policy, but we can agree it is a shame that so many people are going to lose their jobs over the next few years though no fault of their own.
This is John Deere's problem...their disaster...no one else...
 
My point is that there is a whole world desperate to provide me with food. I would rather buy from the USA, but if trump destroys that, I will be fine.
People who can afford to pay $11/lb for tomatoes will be fine. Those who can't, not so much.

This is not the first time in the past 40 years that politics has made it cheaper for farmers to plow their crops back into the ground as fertilizer rather than harvest them.

When the higher prices of both produce and meats hit kitchen tables across the country later this summer, TACO will have to do what he does best. In the meantime, Americans will just have to suffer under his administration.

Trump's Tariffs and Immigration Policies Destroy Thousands of Acres of Tomato Crops in Florida​

“Between the cost of labor and the inputs that goes in, it’s more cost-effective for farmers” to plow over ripe tomatoes, said one expert.


To protect U.S. tomato farmers from the harm caused by tariff policies, Trump plans to impose an import duty of 20.91 percent on most tomato imports from Mexico starting in July. The action, which will end a 2019 trade agreement establishing a minimum price on Mexican imported tomatoes, is expected to drive up the cost of tomatoes for U.S. consumers, according to Michael Strain, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

Other South Florida crops are also being impacted by the Trump administration's trade war. DiMare told WVSN that some Florida watermelon farmers are seeing their Canadian clients source their watermelons from Mexico to avoid Canada's retaliatory 25 percent tariff on American melons.

Labor is another concern: Immigration changes have driven pickers away. One homestead farmer, who chose to stay anonymous for fear of deportation, told WVSN: "A lot of people are really afraid and sometimes they come, sometimes they don't come, and the harvest is lost because it cannot be harvested, so that's why so much produce is lost."
 
This is John Deere's problem...their disaster...no one else...
Are you sure of that? I am seeing a lot of companies teetering on the edge.

Silver Airline ceased operations. It is not unusual for an airline to go bankrupt, but they will usually continue operations. They are just unable to pay past debts. It is almost unheard of for an American airline to cease operations.
 
This is John Deere's problem...their disaster...no one else...
Proof MAGAts are myopic.


Deere confirmed Monday that the production positions being cut are concentrated at two factories in Iowa and one at its home base in Moline, Illinois, where 280 employees will be laid off effective Aug. 30. A combined 310 workers will be let go at the Iowa locations.

In its second-quarter earnings release in May, Deere reported a more than 15% decline in revenue, the third straight quarter of year-over-year sales declines.....

...The U.S. Department of Agriculture anticipates that 2024 net farm income, which is a broad measure of profits, will total $116.1 billion. That’s down 25.5% from a year earlier. Adjusting for inflation, net farm income is expected to be down 27.1% this year as farmers contend with lower prices for soybeans and corn. The USDA said that lower direct government payments and increased production costs are also weighing on farmers.
 
Are you sure of that? I am seeing a lot of companies teetering on the edge.

Silver Airline ceased operations. It is not unusual for an airline to go bankrupt, but they will usually continue operations. They are just unable to pay past debts. It is almost unheard of for an American airline to cease operations.
Have you ever seen an ignorant blowhard who wasn't sure of themselves? They'll deny there's a danger of being run over by a truck up until the truck runs them over. MAGAts ain't too bright.

They look at the prices in the supermarket and either say "I don't see a problem" or "this is left over from Biden and Trump is fixing it". They can't see past this week much less a few months.

When dealing with such people, it's best, IMO, to just step back and let them be hit by the truck. When they lay there screaming in pain and ask for help, best to just let them bleed out. Evolution in action.
 
The funny part about it is that $100/lb for tomatoes would not really change my life much. And yet people who it would be ruinous to do not seem to care.
They'll care but being stupid and myopic, they won't care until they see the prices in the grocery store.

This is no different than avian flu. People can hear about the problem in the news but it doesn't sink in until they are paying $6 for 12 eggs or Waffle House adds a surcharge for eggs.

Example:
Tomatoes on the Vine are .99 a pound at Krogers this week...
 
Principle of economics - A business that pays more in labor than they can sell their product for goes out of business.
Principle of economics - If supply goes down but demand stays the same then prices go up. (Food is a need.)
Principle of economics - If domestic production costs go up three things are likely to happen, supply goes down, price goes up, foreign products replace domestic products.
paying more for food is worth it to keep americans employed and that money in the American economy instead of shipping it to mexico.
 
They'll care but being stupid and myopic, they won't care until they see the prices in the grocery store.

This is no different than avian flu. People can hear about the problem in the news but it doesn't sink in until they are paying $6 for 12 eggs or Waffle House adds a surcharge for eggs.

Example:
We have gotten lucky with avian flu so far. That could kill 10 to 20% of us. That would effect me.
 
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