Montgomery County's Marxist County Council has beaten Zohran Mamdani at his own game. Before the New York City mayor could even acquire a site for his first government-run grocery store, his fellow travelers on the Montgomery County Council are poised to launch a government-run grocery wholesale business. It's a two-part scheme.
Part 1 involves the County awarding one lucky bidder $550,000 in taxpayer funds to build, stock and operate a wholesale grocery warehouse. The government-funded wholesale operation would sell to "schools, senior centers, hospitals, food banks and correctional facilities," according to a press release from Councilmember Andrew Friedson.
Part 2? Friedson is taking a victory lap in proclaiming Montgomery County will be the first jurisdiction in the region to join the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG) Local Food Procurement Challenge. Activating the Montgomery County Anger Translator, we can convert that word salad program name into the English language: The County will mandate the purchase of local farm produce by its "departments and agencies" with "public dollars" on the basis of geography, rather than stretching tight "local dollars" (a.k.a. taxpayer funds) by purchasing the cheapest products from anywhere.
The move continues two longstanding Council trends: socialism, and jacking up the cost of government by continually reducing the number of suppliers of a product or service. These include numerous laws mandating the preference or outright mandate that all bidders or sellers must be minority-owned, woman-owned, or veteran-owned. Likewise, some of the laws have excluded bidders or service providers who do not meet a particular ideological or politically-correct profile determined by the Council.
It doesn't take a Harvard economist to tell you that when you reduce the number of bidders, the cost of the winning bid automatically increases. It's called market economics, and it's only one small reason the County budget has doubled in just the last decade. Equally obvious is that the more public dollars funneled into the grocery business by the County, state, and federal government, the more local grocery prices increase. Heckuva job, Brownie!
27 comments:
Consequences of electing stupid people and giving them unchecked power. Actually, they are far from dumb, they are just off the map Left Wing loons. This won't work because it can't work. There are dozens and dozens of articles and interviewers with people who actually know the grocery business but they don't listen and go forward with dystopian ideas anyway. My gosh, wake up.
Well, since they're already in the liquor business...
Socialism is when people have food nearby that isn't price gouged by corporations, apparently.
Montgomery County prioritizing local farms first, pumping more money into farmowners and the (nationally) struggling agricultural industry? Sounds good to me.
"These include numerous laws mandating the preference or outright mandate that all bidders or sellers must be minority-owned, woman-owned, or veteran-owned" is this supposed to be a bad thing?
I'm expecting to see "Marxibund" on this site, any day now.
What if a white guy (who happens not to be a veteran) can supply it for less and submits a lower bid?
Thanks for providing another opinion and perspective.
Yes, racism is a terrible thing. Sadly, it's no longer shocking to see people like you cheer racism.
Just like Virginia has been for decades, under both Republicans and Democrats (ABC stores).
10:41: The primary responsibilities of government are things like public safety, snow plowing, and ensuring adequate infrastructure. Since Montgomery County is failing at all three, they're not in a position to expand their portfolio. Government should not be in the business of selling groceries, subsidizing failing businesses, and picking winners and losers based on unconstitutional criteria.
9:33 - Exactly. The same cabal that bans everything under the sun it seems yet moves ahead with an idea that is beyond sensible and that won't and cannot work as you rightly stated.
"beyond sensible" - No, I meant an idea that lacks all sense.
“ The primary responsibilities of government are…”
That is your personal belief. It is hardly the consensus of the one million residents of our county.
Ultimate plan is to follow the model of Beer/Wine distribution. All grocery stores in the county will be required to purchase all their food through the County, and the distribution employees will be highly paid county employees whose cost will be paid for out of the cost paid by grocers for food. Stores would then be only allowed to purchase name-brand food. It will eventually drive out food sellers that rely on store brand items (Aldi, Wegmans, Harris Teeter, Target, Lidl, WalMart). The justification is that it is now FAIR because no stores are paying less for their inventory than others. Plus they are getting rid of some EVIL players (they will come up with explanations). Final result will be just like 40-50 years ago, union staffed Giant & Safeway combined will have 75%+ of grocery market and some of the highest food prices in the country.
You had me at Marxist.
Any lib familiar with the Tragedy of the Commons? Nope.
Locally-run schools, prisons, etc. will buy from local farmers?! This is a travesty and clearly socialism (note, I don't own a dictionary so I just use the word "socialism" for anything the government does). I don't understand how these politicians are supported by almost everyone. There are far too many people with common sense in MoCo. It's the absolute worst.
Consequences of electing stupid people and giving them unchecked power. Actually, they are far from dumb, they are just off the map Right Wing, MAGA loons.
There, fixed it for ya!
@Momo - then that person would get the bid, which happens literally everywhere all over the country.
@1:30 - Correct, racism is a terrible thing. I am happy that unconscious biases, racism towards minorities, and prejudice towards women are being mitigated by these programs.
@Robert - Another primary responsibility of government is to provide for its people through social programs, such as assisting those people with the cost and availability of food.
Nothing more hilarious on a rainy Thursday morning then the pearl-clutchings of a bunch of right-wing loons.
Only way to prevent "price gouging" is to have a free market with minimal barriers to entry for maximum competition. Government-run stores create more, not less, monopoly incentive. And Robert couldn't have said it better - government must steward shared resources first and foremost.
While 8:40 can tell all their brain dead cohorts how good it was under Brandon.
8:41/10:41 has never run a business let alone understand how things work. Love watching the left bitch about corporations while on their IPhone or protesting to get rid of fossil fueled power plants because electricity comes from wall sockets.
Meanwhile the left is constantly rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic as they run out of other people's money. You'd be funny if your ilk weren't in charge but here we are. Trump has the left defending Illegals, drug cartels, pedophiles and the latest is the leadership in Iran who just killed over 30K of their own.
And nothing more pathetic than trust-fund babies claiming that the poor are ripping them off.
The Council will be as successful as they were reinventing Downtown Bethesda nightlife.
2:01, funny your substituting 'ripping off' for 'stealing from,' 'threatening,' 'assaultiing,' and 'shooting at.'
10:16 - Sounds great until a big corporation comes in, prices things low to undercut local businesses, waits them out until said local businesses go bankrupt and close, and then jacks their prices up as high as they want. Literally what Walmart has done all over the country to destroy small town economies, leaving the residents with nowhere else to shop. Or maybe the big companies will just collude with eachother in order to keep small companies from ever gaining a foothold, like what oil corporations do every day.
10:44 - Sir, this is a Wendy's. Please take your medication.
Love that 9:23 doesn't understand how things work in the real world yet preaches like AOC. When your parents let you out of the basement and get a real job, let us know how it goes.
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