this post was submitted on 19 Aug 2023
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Environment
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At least in the U.S. taxation wouldn't be needed for animal product prices to reflect their true costs.
Just remove the large government subsidies the animal product industry enjoys and let the free market raise the prices.
I doubt it would happen.
Those subsidies exist because the Nixon administration created them after Americans complained about high food prices. It would be political suicide to remove those subsidies, especially with inflation and price gouging disguised as inflation driving up food prices.
I agree with everything you said, but also it’d be super interesting to cancel the factory farming subsidies and see whole foods flourish. Theoretically this would raise the cost of burgers and lower the cost of vegetables and other healthy products.
I agree it’ll never happen, but it would probably move US closer to European diets.
European diet can be very much centered around meat too unfortunately, farmers also have a lot of power here. Guess it is still better than the US, but we are part of the problem too.
I agree that just stopping subsidies and let everything in the hands of market forces won't do. We cannot juste expect things to work better in the current system, it would need many other forces and institutions to develop another type of agriculture and scale down meat production and consumption and make other products more affordable for everyone, it cannot come only from making meat a luxury good.