The Dollar Store Backlash Has Begun (citylab.com) 371
The U.S. has added 10,000 of these budget retail outlets since 2001. But some towns and cities are trying to push back. From a report: A recent research brief [PDF] by the Institute of Local Self Reliance (ILSR), a nonprofit supporting local economies, sheds light on the massive growth of this budget enterprise. Since 2001, outlets of Dollar General and Dollar Tree (which bought Family Dollar in 2015) have grown from 20,000 to 30,000 in number. Though these "small-box" retailers carry only a limited stock of prepared foods, they're now feeding more people than grocery chains like Whole Foods, which has around 400-plus outlets in the country. In fact, the number of dollar-store outlets nationwide exceeds that of Walmart and McDonalds put together -- and they're still growing at a breakneck pace. That, ILSR says, is bad news. "While dollar stores sometimes fill a need in cash-strapped communities, growing evidence suggests these stores are not merely a byproduct of economic distress," the authors of the brief write. "They're a cause of it."
Dollar stores have succeeded in part by capitalizing on a series of powerful economic and social forces -- white flight, the recent recession, the so-called "retail apocalypse" -- all of which have opened up gaping holes in food access. But while dollar store might not be causing these inequalities per se, they appear to be perpetuating them. The savings they claim to offer shoppers in the communities they move to makes them, in some ways, a little poorer. Using code made public by Jerry Shannon, a geographer at University of Georgia, CityLab made a map showing the spread of dollar stores since the recession.
Dollar stores have succeeded in part by capitalizing on a series of powerful economic and social forces -- white flight, the recent recession, the so-called "retail apocalypse" -- all of which have opened up gaping holes in food access. But while dollar store might not be causing these inequalities per se, they appear to be perpetuating them. The savings they claim to offer shoppers in the communities they move to makes them, in some ways, a little poorer. Using code made public by Jerry Shannon, a geographer at University of Georgia, CityLab made a map showing the spread of dollar stores since the recession.
Yikes and Yuk (Score:4, Funny)
I made my own "grocery store"... (Score:4, Insightful)
A couple wicking beds and two hydroponic ponds out in the yard provides me with enough fresh lettuce, peas, carrots, zucchini, and broccoli that I don't bother going to the grocery store for months. At first, it doesn't seem economical to grow your own veggies when looking at the prices of stuff at the store, but if you can grow enough to reduce the number of trips to the grocery store, the time and fuel savings really stack up.
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Never mind time. This is a boom+bust kind of thing. You will have an entire season to generate a bumper crop at the end. That's the thing about real produce in general.
It's seasonal.
That's why you have things like canning, pickling, and fermenting.
Your window for having "fresh" food is very tiny. Modern tech and certain other shenanigans have given us somewhat unrealistic expectations in this regard.
Re:Yikes and Yuk (Score:5, Insightful)
I've never been to a dollar store.
That is your choice. But you don't get to make that choice for other people. TFA is a rant trying to justify privileged "let them eat cake" snobs imposing their will on others. A poor family struggling to make ends meet does not have the option of shopping at Whole Foods, where feeding their family is likely to cost 3 or 4 times as much, and it is idiotic to suggest that is an alternative.
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A poor family struggling to make ends meet does not have the option of shopping at Whole Foods
You meant shopping at Whole Paycheck. The prices there are ludicrous.
Mod UP pls!
Re: Yikes and Yuk (Score:2)
Re: Yikes and Yuk (Score:2)
Those of the Whole Foods religion claim that big box stores undermine the economy by driving wages lower. By being a national chain, they command brand recognition, and control a large amount of profits for producers of merch.
Dollar General not only has similar consequences, but it doesn't "grow" as the local economy recovers. A Dollar General's produce selection never expands to provide healthi
Re:Yikes and Yuk (Score:4, Insightful)
Exactly - this is a perfect example of the USA working as it should - someone sees a need and fills it, and makes a successful business of it.
TFA is exactly the sort of thing that gave us Trump - people are sick and tired of self-proclaimed geniuses declaring this or that "proper" by their own standards and not letting the rest of us decide for ourselves. People are perfectly willing and able to run their own lives, these sorts of elitist screed against free enterprise are a perfect example of why a huge fraction of the American public has gotten *fed up* with it.
Re: Yikes and Yuk (Score:3, Insightful)
By filling that need in such a manner, and failing to grow as the community recovers, it stalls and kills the local economy.
Ask yourself this? Is it better to have a rookie who doesn't want to learn and isn't capable of all the responsibilities of the job, but who provides just enough assistance to sustain current production? Or is it better to be training a competent and capable employee to enable growth and a competitive
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Whole Foods (Score:5, Insightful)
Comparing dollar stores to Whole Foods is a joke, not only because they have nearly 2 orders of magnitude less stores but Whole Foods has ridiculous prices in comparison. The notion that they're making communities worse off is mostly absurd. The small part that it's not is that other grocery stores with more reasonable prices do exist and provide an even better value, even if they often require more effort to access. The problem is, that truth is pretty much wholly true only so long as people spend their money wisely in those other grocery stores or any potential savings will be lost.
But, yes, please continue this rant against dollar stores.
Re: Whole Foods (Score:4, Funny)
But it's free range organic gluten free sugar!
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Whole Foods does not sell sugar. It only sells evaporated cane juice.
Wait... Dollar Tree? (Score:5, Insightful)
We have one near us - it’s not a grocery store. It is a great place to buy greeting cards, gift wrap (or gift bags), stuff like that. The kind of stuff which is priced unreasonably high elsewhere.
Seriously - why should a paper birthday card cost seven or eight bucks? Why should a gift bag cost ten dollars or more?
Dollar Tree near me has a snack aisle (Score:5, Interesting)
We have one near us - it’s not a grocery store. It is a great place to buy greeting cards, gift wrap (or gift bags), stuff like that. The kind of stuff which is priced unreasonably high elsewhere.
Your Dollar Tree store might be smaller than the one that's about 1.5 miles from my home. It has a party supplies aisle (as you mentioned), a food aisle (mostly snacks), a health and beauty aisle, a toy aisle, and a few others I'm not remembering. I used to hit their snack aisle once every couple weeks for boxes of raisins and "fruit and grain" bars to take to work (until I learned about ALDI, that is).
Seriously - why should a paper birthday card cost seven or eight bucks?
Much of that goes into licensing the famous cartoon character that appears on an expensive Hallmark greeting card but not on the cheaper cards that Dollar Tree sells for $1.00 and Walmart sells for $0.98.
Re:Dollar Tree near me has a snack aisle (Score:5, Interesting)
Much of that goes into licensing the famous cartoon character that appears on an expensive Hallmark greeting card but not on the cheaper cards that Dollar Tree sells for $1.00 and Walmart sells for $0.98.
I’m sure this is part of it... but I haven’t found even generic cards for under five bucks most places. And the price listed on the back of the cards I buy at Dollar Tree - which is what you’d pay if you bought them elsewhere - is usually $3.95, $4.95, or even $5.95.
Re:Dollar Tree near me has a snack aisle (Score:4, Interesting)
The reason they're cheaper is because they're last years cards. Every year the card companies rotate out the older material. And then sell the warehouse cases to the dollar stores dirt cheap.
Heaven forbid there's a chance your middle/upper class customers commit a faux pas of giving someone a card they got last year? *gasp*
There is no licensing (Score:2)
"Much of that goes into licensing the famous cartoon character that appears on an expensive Hallmark greeting card but not on the cheaper cards that Dollar Tree sells for $1.00 and Walmart sells for $0.98."
What cards are you looking at?
Card at standard store: Bland holiday picture and bland well wishing.
Card at dollar store: Exact same thing.
What type of expensive IPs are you seeing being applied to cards because I'm not seeing any?
There are places where one can *sometimes* find legitimately clever and/or a
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Also, if you're giving one to younger children...all they want is the gift or the cash in the card. A simple 99 cash/gift card holder is good enough.
Re: There is no licensing (Score:2)
I honestly think that greeting cards are one industry that millennials truly will kill. Or at least force substantial price reductions on.
My parents don't bother with birthday cards - instead they buy a block of chocolate and write happy birthday on that, because it's the same price and obviously chocolate is far better than some cardboard.
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14 like the guy commenting last night about how hes been getting free .tk domains since he was 11... Slashdot has gone downhill. However I started reading slashdot at a young age but not that young.
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It's a shame that "one price" shops are so down market in the west. The UK and Ireland are the same.
In Japan the one price shops are much nicer, and the stuff is a lot better quality. Maybe it's because they are closer to China. Shops like Daiso in particular are great. Some of the tools you get there are actually top notch stuff, and with everything you don't feel like you are just forced to buy crap because you are poor, you actually choose it because it's decent.
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Are there any actual one price shops any more? There used to be "everything's $1.00" but they seem to be gone. Dollar tree and general both have some higher priced items, and Daiso is chock-full of them. (Daiso is also the only one of these stores I will go into, because all the other are filled with toxic garbage.)
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Maybe it's different in the US. In Japan almost everything in the shop is 100 yen (plus tax), with a few items at 200 or 300 yen. It's 99.9% just 100 yen though.
I wish they existed in Europe.
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We have Daiso and the Chinese knock-off Miniso in Australia as well.
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I was surprised by how decent Miniso was, although it's like a hybrid of Uniqlo and Daisou. In China it's actually kinda expensive, relatively.
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Re: Dollar Tree near me has a snack aisle (Score:5, Insightful)
Googling something only works if you have the slightest clue what you are looking for. It could be the top result, but how the heck would someone know if that's what the story was about.
The summary should have it, but since it doesn't you could be civil instead.
Yes, civility is important. So is reading comprehension. What are we discussing? Dollar Stores, ie. small market stores. Google ALDI and what's the first thing the pops up resembling what we're discussing? Hey, what do you know, it's ALDI Grocery Stores.
Quit enabling stupid.
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Considering that the relevant search result from google is search result #1, I think you are a bit in the wrong there AC.
Also, #2 result is the Wikipedia entry concerning the supermarket chain in question.
So uhm... Yeah. Google is your friend on this.
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That's only true if it's a common word, like machicolations or hermeneutics.
Or if some imbecile chooses an existing word to name their pet new hipster programming language.
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Re:Wait... Dollar Tree? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Wait... Dollar Tree? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, Dollar Tree is good. AA batteries are 8 for $1. You can get stuff like soap and other misc household items. You pay 2x as much for the same stuff at the grocery store.
This article is ridiculous.
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The misc household items category is always overlooked.
$30 gift card = 30 kitchen items. A perfect present for a couple who are just getting married.
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Their batteries are great. Maybe they are only Zinc low capacity ones, but for stuff like remote controls that's fine and still cheaper than buying longer life ones.
Personally I try to use rechargable ones on principal, but for things like remote controls they often aren't much good due to lower voltage and extended periods of non-use.
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What a capital fellow you are!
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Their batteries are garbage. They have no quality control whatsoever, and they don't keep whether you use them or not. Same as the worthless batteries at harbor freight.
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Batteries from harbor freight aren't worthless. They work great as free paper weights.
Re: Wait... Dollar Tree? (Score:2)
Are you sure you are getting enough feedbacks on your cards or gift wrap?
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If the gift bag costs $10 or more.. They're getting an empty bag with a receipt in it and they better be fucking happy!
--Highdude702(mods)
Re: Wait... Dollar Tree? (Score:4, Interesting)
Same in the UK , what used to be small private shoos are now taken over by pound stretcher or pound world, usually with a gold buyer/ pawn shop next door and and an obligatory betting shop next to that, it does say alot about the declining middle class...
Re: Wait... Dollar Tree? (Score:2)
But these shops are probably selling a lot of the same items that shops 20 years ago would have charged 4 times the price for. Sure there will be people who can't pay more, but then there's also the fact that these shops can now buy products so cheaply and ship from China so easily, that they can compete with the stores of yesteryear and drive them out of business.
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As opposed to people simply being cheap (like me)? I can certainly afford to get canned goods at a grocery but I can get that $4.59 can of chicken pot pie stew (same brand - Campbell's - looking at one I got from the kitchen) for $1.59 at my local dollar store, so I do (a couple of dozen at a time). You're making a leap dictated by your bias.
Most of their pricing (Score:5, Informative)
isn't really that good. Family Dollar is a good example of this. Their canned beans are pretty cheap (unless you buy bulk dried beans) The Dollar smaller packages, or charges more for items than local stores.
If you look (in season) most people live close to a local farmers market. Their prices are usually much lower than local stores. Dollar stores in general don't have anything fresh that I've ever seen.
As far as things like meat, I don't think I've seen anything except hot dogs or canned chicken in the dollar stores.
Finally if you're financially constrained (receiving social services support), you don't get much "fresh" food from food banks, more government cheese. maybe some honey or rice.
I do some shopping at wal-mart, mostly buying their loss leaders, like their giant jars of pickles, never anything in the Meat Department because their prices and quality are not up to par with other local stores.
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Compromise: how about a two-fifty store?
You'd probably like Five Below [wikipedia.org] if there's one in your area. Or try Dollar General or Family Dollar.
Re: Most of their pricing (Score:2, Insightful)
If you're poor, why the fuck would you buy a bag of popcorn anywhere?
Pop it yourself for almost zero dollars.
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Fire is out of this world because you're waiting for it to come from the sky gods.
You should be growing free-range fire yourself. It's a little extra effort but it's non-GMO/hormone.
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You don't need a popcorn popper. You can use a larger pot with a little bit of oil and pop the popping corn on the stove top.
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> If you look (in season) most people live close to a local farmers market. Their prices are usually much lower than local stores.
Huh? I've been to many of the farmer markets and prices there are higher than at grocery stores, but the produce is better too. Well-off people typically go to those (observation based on what cars they come in) to get the best stuff like the best tomatoes vs what awful tasteless red stuff they sell at the grocery stores (even Whole Foods).
t
The two local farm markets I go to price things differently, but other than organic chicken eggs, ($3.00 a dozen) all the fruits and vegetables are about 1/4 to 1/3 of the price of similar wares at (chain) grocery stores. I still can't find anyone who grows celery though.
These are of course farm markets that grow their own goods. If you have a large family, there are also some very good Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) groups that will sell you enormous piles of food.
There are other markets that buy
Read the article, which is divorced from reality (Score:5, Insightful)
The end of the article has a statement from one of the researchers bemoaning the fact that the Kroger's in her neighborhood, which is primarily fixed income and suffered a 50% foreclosure rate during the last housing crises doesn't stock more expensive foods, "The one in a whiter, more affluent neighborhood regularly advertises grains, nuts, seafood, olives, and wine." Uh, the Kroger's in your neighborhood doesn't advertise it because they won't sell and, surprisingly, stores tend not to stock things that don't sell. That's not The Dollar Stores fault, that's caused by a raft of other issues (racism, predatory payday loan stores, the list is lengthy) but denying access to low cost goods in the hopes that the Kroger's that 15 minutes closer to you will start stocking things that the neighborhood can't afford is asinine.
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Unless one has had to deal with prices at what are sometimes called "corner stores", Dollar Stores DO look more expensive... But they aren't competition for Krogers, Walmart or Whole Foods.
They compete with those corner stores with REALLY prices and shelves loaded with "sugar", booze and nicotine.
Is quality at the Dollar Store the same as the "high priced" spread? Not really, but it's a whole lot better than either nothing or the price gouging of the corner store.
The gist: (Score:5, Informative)
(Posting this because I was curious, and annoyed that I was forced to skim the actual article. Skim! Outrage.)
Re:The gist: (Score:5, Insightful)
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THis is just the 5 and dime thing all over again, and the great stores, TG&Y, Woolworths, are all gone. Only Walmart and Kmart remain fro that time. Stores that adapt and work to serve customers will survive and prosper. Those that don't meet customers needs will fail.
In fact collar stores aren't cheap, but neither is krogers. My krogers is a piece of shit, and I know why people in the area go to t
Re:That's an economic signal (Score:5, Interesting)
This is what sociologists call a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Years ago I worked in public health, and there was an analogous process that occurred with illegal tire dumps. Someone would be driving to the dump and decide to save the tipping fee by tossing their tire by the side of the road. Then a second person would come along with an old tire, and figuring that two tires really aren't any worse than one, he'd dump his there too. The process would snowball at an extraordinary rate, and soon you'd have hundreds, thousands, or even millions of tires. The largest were called "tire mountains", weighed tens of thousands of tons, and were too expensive to move for reprocessing. It's cheaper to build a tire reprocessing plant on site.
Here's my point: there isn't anything inherently special about that spot along the side of the road. Destiny didn't mark single it out as the future site of a tire mountain. Some random person decided to treat it as a place to dump his crap, and because people are herd animals that triggered a crap tidal wave.
There's nothing inherently special or irredeemable about shithole neighborhoods either. But once the world decides they're places to shit on, there's nothing the people living there can do about it.
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and soon you'd have hundreds, thousands, or even millions of tires.
Millions of tires? Because the county was too blind to the situation to pick up the tires when they reached 50 and post a "Do not dump" sign? I call shenanigans.
---
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This is also how so many lobbyists got into Washington.
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Yes, millions of tires in some case. But *thousands* of tires is an enormous problem too. A dry tire weighs between 20 and 30 pounds. Fill it with water and you add another ten pounds. So a thousand tires could amount to around fifteen tons. It is not cheap to deal with that.
Obviously it's good practice to jump on something like this quickly, but it's not always clear (until a local government has experience with something like this) whose job it is to handle, and by the time you notice it and figure
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"There's nothing inherently special or irredeemable about shithole neighborhoods either. "
In my experience, there absolutely is. For example, the shitty part of lake county ca is the city of clear lake. That's the side of the lake with the most mercury contamination. Or in yuba-sutter, olivehurst is the place with the most flood risk. Even in Santa Cruz county, it's way hotter in watsonville, and the beach flats are the flood plain.
There is at least a historical reason for shithole neighborhoods, if not an
Gaps between Walmarts (Score:5, Insightful)
I live in a rural area, and in places like this the dollar stores are built to fill in the gaps between the Walmarts. They are geographically dispersed roughly every 10-15 miles where there is any kind of "populated area". Here, at least, where it is rural, they are providing a needed service.
Walmarts and the big gas stations along the interstates have killed off most of the independent gas stations and country stores that used to serve the small (1000 people) populated areas. You used to go to these stores for the basic stuff - bread, milk, candy bars, snack stuff. Most also had a small variety of hardware, fishing and hunting related stuff, and sometimes a small deli or grill. These are pretty much all gone. They used to be along state routes every several miles, and they enjoyed enough traffic to do well. The interstates took a great deal of volume (especially through traffic) off those roads and condensed them into major arteries. Those arteries have extremely limited points of access, and the land at each exit is so incredibly expensive that only huge chains can afford to have a business presence there.
So, most of these small stores have gone out of business. Now if you needed to run to the store because your propane lighter ran out of fuel and you couldn't light your grill, or the kids were pestering for batteries for their game controller, you had to travel 25-30 minutes to the regional Walmart. Dollar stores are filling those empty holes. They didn't cause them (well, certainly they have run some mom and pop places out of business, but the majority of the damage was already done a decade or more ago). Around here in the boonies, it's a welcome sight having a store like this within a few minutes of home.
In this area, they have popped up in the very rural country areas in the last 2-3 years. The local stores went out of business well before that.
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How the fuck can people live out in these god forsaken backwoods
I have a rifle range.
I have game. I have a 55' antenna tower and talk to the world on HF.
At night it's quiet. Dead quiet. No traffic, no sirens, no idiots with 500W subwoofer hoopties.
I know my neighbors. Shit poast on the interwebs all you want, but if you come here watch your mouth.
Re:Gaps between Walmarts (Score:4, Interesting)
How the fuck can people live out in these god forsaken backwoods places where you have to drive for a half hour to get to a bodega?
Would you prefer that farmers moved to the city and stopped farming? Then you'd have nothing to eat. Or would you prefer that farmers moved to the city and brought their animals with them?
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would you prefer that farmers moved to the city and brought their animals with them?
That would be excellent!
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And you have to ask WHY?
Open your eyes sardine.
SJWs at it again (Score:5, Interesting)
I live in remote rural Appalachia. The last couple of years have seen an influx of Dollar General stores al over the region. They have opened in isolated communities that had NOTHING. Not even a place to buy a coke or a pack of gum. At Dollar General you can buy household supplies, clothes, food, all sorts of things that make life easier, far easier than driving 50 miles to a Walmart.
This article is myopic and is only concerned with ghetto people who might live 5 miles from a decent grocery store. Try living 50 miles from one and see if Dollar General is a problem. To folks around here it is welcome and improves quality of life.
Egad. Cheap food isn't evil. (Score:5, Interesting)
Listen - cheap goods aren't a magic bullet cause of economic stress.
If I made a farming robot that grew a variety of high quality food for $0.05 a kilogram, and sold it to people for $0.07 a kilogram, it would mean that a lot of folks would be spending less money - and I might even put some types of business out of a market niche - but that does NOT have to cause mass poverty.
Rather, it causes a limited market failure. Market failures are where the ideals of 'free markets' break down - because they tend to happen when there isn't any room for incentives left.
I'd say this is ideally where the basic role of government lies. Government in this case meaning a group of people that decides common shared action for their mutual shared benefit.
When goods are too cheap for markets to pay people a living wage to have them on market - that makes it a perfect role for a government to play, to literally share the burden of, for instance, making sure that no one starves from neglect, or is unable to live productive lives for not benefiting a company enough.
Those flaws are 'externalities' to a corporate mindset, but the whole reason we work together as human beings outside that mindset.
Being able to produce practically endless amounts of good quality cheap food is a legitimate cause for real celebration - I don't find the argument that because it can also cause limited market failure to be a flaw.
Back in time, corporations were things that often existed for a limited time to serve a common community need, which were then dissolved when that need was met - it's why we still have corporate charters on them.. I think that may have been a healthier way to view that balance.
I mean, we've been taxing folks to keep farms alive for generations now - it's a legitimate logical problem letting market forces eliminate our agricultural infrastructure. Basically every part of society still has some aspects of it that supersede some market ideal - no matter how capitalist we idealize ourselves to be.
Ryan Fenton
That's fine but dollar stores aren't cheap (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Egad. Cheap food isn't evil. (Score:4, Interesting)
I mean, we've been taxing folks to keep farms alive for generations now - it's a legitimate logical problem letting market forces eliminate our agricultural infrastructure.
Well, especially with food there’s a legitimate argument to make that a country needs to be at least marginally self-sufficient for purposes of self-defense. In the US, for example, it’s probably true that without any subsidies the vast majority of our food production would migrate to outside our borders (a fair bit of it is there already) - which could be problematic in wartime.
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Cheap food isn't evil, fake food is. Most of what the dollar store sells has little nutritional value, but it still displaces real food stores which sell real food. Congratulations on failing to understand the argument, but commenting anyway.
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People donâ(TM)t know how to cook, and they arenâ(TM)t willing to learn. So fake, ultra-processed âoefoodâ is what they get.
Western society is apparently designed to produce victims. Those people have been convinced that cooking is hard. They can be convinced otherwise. Educating them is government's job, at which it is deliberately failing for the benefit of corporations.
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You mean the "good" stores who chose not to go there because they can't be sustained in that market particular market... Are being "driven" out by a conglomerate that does a better job serving the neighborhood than the existing "corner stores" (basically liquor stores)? And you're saying nothing is better than being gouged by the liquor store?
What is your solution? Not just finger wagging and scolding. Solution. Tell ya what... How about we take your paycheck and use it to build the kind of store you th
You can't beat the prices (Score:3)
Like the subject says, you can't beat the prices of these stores for brand name items. I buy tons of stuff like cleaning products and simple food ingredients. They sell Spleda for like half the price of what grocery stores charge.
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Today, I just opened my second tube of Krazy Glue (in the green cylinder) that I got from Dollar Tree. Like the first one, it was ROCK SOLID before I even opened it. It's the "name brand" glue, but I don't know what they did to it to make it cure INSIDE the tube.
Repeated thermal cycling, leading to packaging failure. This is why the only super glue you should ever buy is a multi-pack of the cheapest stuff possible. CA glue is very simple and there's no benefit to buying name brand unless you want gap-filling, in which case I recommend buying "Zap!" from a busy hobby store which rotates stock regularly.
Once upon a time, pretty much everything at the dollar stores was something that some other business couldn't sell. Today, most of the stuff at dollar stores is actua
Rich people point at poor people stores... (Score:4, Insightful)
...and say "eww ban it now."
The real reason (Score:4, Interesting)
These stores are thriving because they are offering the products that people want to buy at prices that they can afford. Most sane people would not have a problem with that.
I guess I'm missing the point somewhere (Score:2)
Dollar stores exist because the folks who aren't doing very well financially need somewhere they can go to buy basics. When even WalMart is too damned expensive for a non-trivial number of folks, there is something terribly wrong with the wage levels in this country.
I'm guessing if we bothered to do something about the income inequality gap, there really wouldn't be much of a need for a Dollar Store in the first place.
Since that is unlikely to ever happen ( didn't happen under Democrats when they were in c
Like a Whole Foods would replace a Dollar Tree? (Score:2)
What they are and are not (Score:4, Insightful)
The author is trying to make this a race thing about food. Sorry, there is no great conspiracy, they are just dollar stores. If an area has a market for "fresh food", then usually it will be filled. The reality is that either people in certain areas don't want "fresh food" or won't pay for it, so the stores that would sell it either don't offer it or they close down. This is what the market does- it fills demands in order to survive and make profit.
Dollar stores aren't trying to be grocery stores, they are supplying a limited number of long shelf-life products that *sell* to people who want it, as a convenience, in an otherwise very much non-food store. At least the ones I have been in, 80% of the store are things like housewares, cards, gifts, personal hygiene supplies, plastic goods, balloons, decor, books, games, toys, office supplies, etc.
Dollar stores are great for finding some inexpensive supplies and gifts. I go there frequently. But you have to watch their SIZES of things- the pricing is not always good for what you get and can be had cheaper at Walmart or even a grocery store. But lots of things are much cheaper than can be had anywhere else, and some things not available at all anywhere else (locally).
If the goal is for people to eat better, that requires education, which creates desire and demand, which then stimulates supply creation. Supply will not create demand. The process is not perfect, but that is generally how it works (and no other process works better in the long run).
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Re:What they are and are not (Score:5, Insightful)
Precisely correct. The author is trying to apply classical Marxist (economic-group) and Neo-Marxist (race-group) theory to dollar stores and predictably finding oppression where it doesn't exist.
I suspect the Marxist theorists from the 1940's had the same thing to say about five-and-dime stores, which were the pre-stagflation version of dollar stores. We had one when I was a kid and nobody there was oppressed either.
Meanwhile, non-Marxist economics has pulled more people out of abject poverty in the past two decades than in all of previous human history. THAT's something to be joyous about on Christmas morning.
There's no backlash (Score:2, Insightful)
This is yet another bunch of jerks deciding to make trouble for yet another niche business. We seem to have a never ending supply of random complaining about anything and everything, from people who create nothing themselves (except unbelievable tales about how [whatever thing] is secretly the cause of [whatever social problem]).
Dollar stores are places to get cheap stuff. Why should people have to pay 2-3x as much to get the same stuff at the supermarket?
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And if you primarily shop for groceries at Dollar General it keeps Darwin happy.
Except this is misplaced anger .... (Score:5, Insightful)
I live in a small town that was absent a real grocery store for years. We had both a Family Dollar and a Dollar General though.
Guess what? Grocery stores weren't deciding not to come here because those dollar stores were too difficult to compete with!
It was simply a matter of analyzing the economics. Our population is only around 6,000 -- and you don't add more than a few thousand others if you add the next town over from us, along with people on the other side of the river, who live in another small town, in another state.
We finally DID get a full size grocery store here, but only because it was part of a long-term plan for a planned community of new homes that have been getting built on the outer edge of town for 5 years or so. They waited out the economic depression before constructing it, but decided it was feasible to do now.
Both dollar stores are doing about as much business as ever, BTW. They're simply the cheaper places to go for your toiletries and household items. Plus, they're more flexible in adjusting their inventory to the local community's needs. Family Dollar, out here, turns into a pretty respectable toy store around Christmastime, and then scales that back afterwards. They'll turn into a one-stop shop for your basic gardening and outdoor BBQ needs when the weather gets nicer. They NEVER claimed to be a place to buy your fresh foods though. They're just convenient for the non-perishables like you might grab to put in your kid's school lunch, or when you need something in a pinch.
I've seen these rants before about "food deserts" and the usual insinuation that racism and "white privilege" has something to do with it. Sorry, but no.... This stuff happens when either A) you live in a more rural or smaller town and the total population isn't enough for the grocery chains to cost-justify coming in, or B) you live in a high crime neighborhood that runs out the large grocers because of all the extra burdens it places on them. (I used to live in one of those areas too, and things like the requirement to hire armed security guards to patrol the parking lot and entrance, plus the fact the crime scared a lot of people off from trying to shop there in the first place, made it unsustainable for them.)
idiotic nonsense written by an idiot (Score:2)
Not surprised. (Score:2, Insightful)
Newsflash! (Score:2)
Society closing in on post-scarcity economy! Stores turning into walk-in storage and distribution warehouses with token pricing!
Next up:
Water wet!
It doesn't make them poorer directly FFS (Score:2)
What it does is depress prices locally, causing other prices to drop, like housing, and such.
Which only makes the locals more able/likely to purchase at those prices.
Which means the prices drop all around and depress the area even further.
Basic fucking economics, people. Low priced areas breed low-priced outcomes. Bring the wages and prices up, the economy enjoys some amount of prospoerity for a sustained period of time instead of a short period of time gained by thrifting the poor.
Our local store was put in ready-made building (Score:2)
Our Dollar Tree was put in a building which used to be a smaller supermarket.
Building was still in great condition, parking lot already there.
I'm wondering how many other dollar stores specifically look for these types of locations. It would save them tons of overhead when it comes to opening a new location.
These are convenance stores (Score:2)
How dare capitalists enter an underserved market! (Score:5, Insightful)
In rural Arizona, dollar stores spring up in those places that don't quite have the population density for a full-service grocery, where they offer local service in in competition with a big-box store that might be a 20-minute drive away. I even see them tucked into strip malls that already have supermarkets. In such places, they offer more selection in such things as school supplies. Think of them as the next step up from convenience stores.
Dollar General is Not a dollar store (Score:2)
Sorry, the author is an idiot. The article is a mindless piece of trash.
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Indeed.
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Because they wanted to buy all the good stuff before everyone else.
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It's as though the "left" has decided FOX News tactics are correct. It's REALLY troubling.
That's why they have turned CNN into their own mirror image of Fox. Remember when there were major journalism houses that, although they had clearly labeled editorial opinions of their own, could be relied on for basic news accuracy?
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Yeah, maybe, but this is the same response I see from those "professional" writers... And they STILL don't answer civil questions.
Odd how it works that the best that can be done is name calling.
sigh
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Everyone can make the same choices. We all have the same free will. Most of us simply choose unwisely. It's not even a rich versus poor thing. Even the "rich" make many of the same stupid choices the "poor" do.
Everyone is encouraged by the same liberal media to make the same wasteful and counterproductive choices.
Vegan communists will be the first to defend nonsense like "Avocado toast".
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Even if you want to "eat healthy", there are better ways of going about it than buying into over hyped and over priced nonsense.
Simple frugal choices like cabbage versus kale.