Global Supply Chain Crisis 2021: Megathread - A cozy thread for watching the supply chain fall apart just in time for the holidays

[George Lucas]

Israelies always payed out the ass for petrol. It's 100% draconian government tariffs to try to dissuade the population from getting a car (while not giving any worthwhile alternatives since taxies are costly as shit, the trains constantly late or break down, buses are also late and are in general disgusting, and the subway program is like 10 years overdue. Oh and did I mention all of the above aren't operational on Saturdays? Since why exactly will people want to go outside on a day off?).
At least there seems to be no shortage of food due to the agriculture sector being relatively self reliant, but like petrol the prices always been crazy high.

Sounds like Italy.

What is it about the Mediterranean Sea that makes everything late?

 

[contradiction of terns]

Bendir

Nothing silly about it. The Chinese economy is starting to melt down and the US economy is going to follow. Not for financial reasons, but because if China stops producing Ball Besrings, Nails, Nuts, Bolts and Plastic the US won't be producing jack shit either because we outsourced all our critical inputs to China, because an American made Nail cost 3 cents but a Chinese made nail costs 1 cent. And if China goes down, there won't be any nails. For anyone.

For want of a nail...

... the kingdom was lost.

Though, me, personally, I think the proverbial 'lost nail' in this case will be fuel. The largest oil storage hub in the US is nearing empty. Biden's attempt to beg OPEC for salvation has, predictably, fallen through. One town in California is already at $7.59 a gallon for gas.

On an unrelated note the ports in California are now dumping their shipping containers in residential neighborhoods, which have responded by blockading their streets to prevent the trucks from dropping off anything else, or removing anything.

 

[Mr. Bung]

Sweet, I got two of them sitting in my garage.

Gentlemen, the bidding starts at 1,000 dollars.

I got one in the crawlspace, but it's gonna be used to hold logs for shiitake cultivation.

 

[Ancient Pioneer]

On an unrelated note the ports in California are now dumping their shipping containers in residential neighborhoods, which have responded by blockading their streets to prevent the trucks from dropping off anything else, or removing anything.

Good thing we have the free market which will sort this out, obviously wages will rise dramatically for the truckers and stevedores so they'll be incentivized to come from across the country to clear the backlog, if only temporarily.

 

[WeDon'tNeedToWhisper]

I'm not normally a pepper but now is the time to stock up on canned goods and other items with a long shelf life, like rice. Also, don't forget water. You can get some 55 gallon food-safe drums for cheap and fill them up yourself. If the situation doesn't improve, things can get chaotic quickly. If the situation does get better, then at least you have some spare food you can eat whenever.

Oh, fuck off. Where do you live? I don't care.

I was at the grocery store the other day, like I am a few times a week (PL), and they have plenty of water. More than that, actually. The boxes of water were so stocked, they had to put them on the ground.

Also, Progresso(?) soup was on sale for $1.79, which I think is usually almost $4. And the shelf was stocked. I might happen to be in a better location than others that makes food supply easier? You're dooming so hard, I can't tell if you're trolling. Gas has gone up at Costco by .06, that worries me.

 

[Titos]

Put 10 bucks of gas in my car and it barely even made the needle move. 3 fucking gallons for 10 bucks, ridiculous. I remember when I bought my shitbox I could get it filled for like 25 bucks, gas was like $1.80, still not as bad as California back in like 2008 when it was almost 5 bucks/gal everywhere but Costco.

 

[PotatoSalad4711]

Oh, fuck off. Where do you live? I don't care.

I was at the grocery store the other day, like I am a few times a week (PL), and they have plenty of water. More than that, actually. The boxes of water were so stocked, they had to put them on the ground.

Also, Progresso(?) soup was on sale for $1.79, which I think is usually almost $4. And the shelf was stocked. I might happen to be in a better location than others that makes food supply easier? You're dooming so hard, I can't tell if you're trolling. Gas has gone up at Costco by .06, that worries me.

I don’t think they’re really dooming. It never hurts to be prepared. Luckily, I’m not a picky eater, so I’ll take whatever’s on the shelf (even though Progresso soup sucks ass). Gas prices here have gone up 0.79 in a months time.

I tried to warn my friend she may need to buy things early, but all I got was “oh, okay, thanks” which means she’s not going to. Well at least I tried.

 

[Uranus Pink]

The Common Agricultural Policy was ostensibly implemented to prevent food overproduction and ensure food price stability, to prevent farmers going bankrupt, but in reality it was implemented to protect French agriculture from competition, both from within the union and from outside of it.

Sounds awfully like the shit "New Deals" FDR had implemented that made the Great Depression worse.

 

[Evo]

Oh, fuck off. Where do you live? I don't care.

I was at the grocery store the other day, like I am a few times a week (PL), and they have plenty of water. More than that, actually. The boxes of water were so stocked, they had to put them on the ground.

Also, Progresso(?) soup was on sale for $1.79, which I think is usually almost $4. And the shelf was stocked. I might happen to be in a better location than others that makes food supply easier? You're dooming so hard, I can't tell if you're trolling. Gas has gone up at Costco by .06, that worries me.

Varies enormously by location and time - it's not that supply is infinitely lacking in certain areas (or you'd see shortages so total that crimewaves would've resulted by now), it's that the supply is starting to limit itself and starting to collapse therefore you're seeing less of certain items in a given area, less of a certain type of item in a given area, so on and so forth - personally for me, I'm noticing some stores are completely and utterly empty very often while other stores maintain (most) stock and this is due to whoever they receive supply from - you've got major suppliers on the EC like McClane that are enormously struggling to find drivers right now for anything at all (and they're also struggling to find new trucks, apparently.) so any market or retail establishment that receives supply from them is starting to look barebones on the EC.

All of this is something in still very early stages of occurrence so, yes, the areas in which one feels the impact will vary and limit themselves by local supply, chosen out-of-state suppliers, etc. but rest assured, if it hasn't reached you yet, it most certainly will at the rate we're going and for someone to point out that the shelves are empty in the area isn't doomerism, it's fucking observation, my guy - it's walking into the nearest supermarket, seeing that the shelves are empty and noticing that shelves are also turning up empty in various other parts of the country with various other parts of the media constantly talking about a collapsing supply chain, it isn't fucking doomerism to walk outside, see storm clouds, and say "oh boy it looks like storms are coming"; where I am, empty shelves didn't actually start appearing up until just a week ago but empty shelves started being an issue for major metropolitan areas on the EC much earlier than us or really anyone else in this country - in the case of the establishments I referenced above that do maintain stock? They're slowly running out of a given item while other stock is thus far fine or unimpacted but also often receive warnings directly from their own upper-management that supply chain issues are causing more and more pressure and woe on their own personal supply chain.

We've got nearly 100 cargo ships completely jammed and congested at Californian ports, with no relief on the way - the supply that's here right now is capable of keeping quite a few areas of the country logistically supplied but we don't have enough coming in to actually replenish these lost supplies; I don't understand how someone can take a fucking country as large and complex as the United States, state 'haha this isn't happening in my immediate area, thus there is no problem, despite it happening in 10 given other areas, and will assuredly never impact me haha' without being literally fucking lobotomized of intelligence and observational ability.

 

[WeDon'tNeedToWhisper]

I don’t think they’re really dooming. It never hurts to be prepared. Luckily, I’m not a picky eater, so I’ll take whatever’s on the shelf (even though Progresso soup sucks ass). Gas prices here have gone up 0.79 in a months time.

I tried to warn my friend she may need to buy things early, but all I got was “oh, okay, thanks” which means she’s not going to. Well at least I tried.

Not dooming? mmmm,

now is the time to stock up on canned goods and other items with a long shelf life, like rice. Also, don't forget water. You can get some 55 gallon food-safe drums for cheap and fill them up yourself.

Also, "progresso sucks ass" You're not a picky eater? Great. Starve and leave the soup for the rest of us.

 

[WeDon'tNeedToWhisper]

Varies enormously by location and time - it's not that supply is infinitely lacking in certain areas (or you'd see shortages so total that crimewaves would've resulted by now), it's that the supply is starting to limit itself and starting to collapse therefore you're seeing less of certain items in a given area, less of a certain type of item in a given area, so on and so forth - personally for me, I'm noticing some stores are completely and utterly empty very often while other stores maintain (most) stock and this is due to whoever they receive supply from - you've got major suppliers on the EC like McClane that are enormously struggling to find drivers right now for anything at all (and they're also struggling to find new trucks, apparently.) so any market or retail establishment that receives supply from them is starting to look barebones on the EC.

All of this is something in still very early stages of occurrence so, yes, the areas in which one feels the impact will vary and limit themselves by local supply, chosen out-of-state suppliers, etc. but rest assured, if it hasn't reached you yet, it most certainly will at the rate we're going and for someone to point out that the shelves are empty in the area isn't doomerism, it's fucking observation, my guy - it's walking into the nearest supermarket, seeing that the shelves are empty and noticing that shelves are also turning up empty in various other parts of the country with various other parts of the media constantly talking about a collapsing supply chain, it isn't fucking doomerism to walk outside, see storm clouds, and say "oh boy it looks like storms are coming"; where I am, empty shelves didn't actually start appearing up until just a week ago but empty shelves started being an issue for major metropolitan areas on the EC much earlier than us or really anyone else in this country - in the case of the establishments I referenced above that do maintain stock? They're slowly running out of a given item while other stock is thus far fine or unimpacted but also often receive warnings directly from their own upper-management that supply chain issues are causing more and more pressure and woe on their own personal supply chain.

We've got nearly 100 cargo ships completely jammed and congested at Californian ports, with no relief on the way - the supply that's here right now is capable of keeping quite a few areas of the country logistically supplied but we don't have enough coming in to actually replenish these lost supplies; I don't understand how someone can take a fucking country as large and complex as the United States, state 'haha this isn't happening in my immediate area, thus there is no problem, despite it happening in 10 given other areas, and will assuredly never impact me haha' without being literally fucking lobotomized of intelligence and observational ability.

I'm tired of pasta

 

[PotatoSalad4711]

Not dooming? mmmm,


Also, "progresso sucks ass" You're not a picky eater? Great. Starve and leave the soup for the rest of us.

Saying stock up on some extra canned goods, water, etc. isn’t really “dooming” in my book. Wasn’t trying to attack you or anything.

Also, lol, my point was I’ll eat whatever even if I don’t like the taste. Hell, I’ve had frog legs and gator tail (not a fan of the former, but the latter is pretty good).

 

[Billy Beer]

in a BBC article about one supplier moaning about not getting supplies, they said, as an offhand comment, that inflation had hit them in the region of 18%.

Is that a forecast of what will hit the end user, or will that be lower by the time it filters down to us? 18% inflation AND an interest rate raise would kill a lot of people.

 

[teriyakiburns]

Not dooming? mmmm,

Being prepared for a shortage isn't dooming, it's common sense. It's easy to assume, when things are great that they'll always be great, but anyone with even a lick of sense would tell you that's a dumb assumption to make. What if you suddenly lose your job tomorrow? Sure, you might have savings you can live off, but even in the best of days it can take a lot of time to find a new job, and in the meantime you're eating liquidity, setting yourself up to be blindsided by a sudden financial problem. A burst water pipe, a boiler breaking down, a blown transmission. You just ate the means to pay for it.

Basic prep is an investment. You build up a stock over time so that you have enough food to even out the odd bump life might throw at you.

Is that a forecast of what will hit the end user, or will that be lower by the time it filters down to us? 18% inflation AND an interest rate raise would kill a lot of people.

It's not a forecast, it's likely what the inflation rate already is. The officially reported inflation rate is heavily manipulated by the bank of england, usually by switching products in and out of the "basket" they use to measure the rate. It's a big part of the reason why wages have stagnated so heavily in this country despite huge increases in the cost of living - especially the cost of food. I'd guess food price inflation is north of 20% at the moment, but they're holding the headline rate down by including luxury and consumer goods that have falling in price due to a lack of demand.

The normal response to rising inflation is to increase interest rates, but that only works if you aren't also expanding the money supply. UK.gov policy for the last few years has been to just generate more money from thin air every time they want to look like they're fixing things.

 

[Never Scored]

Bendir

Nothing silly about it. The Chinese economy is starting to melt down and the US economy is going to follow. Not for financial reasons, but because if China stops producing Ball Besrings, Nails, Nuts, Bolts and Plastic the US won't be producing jack shit either because we outsourced all our critical inputs to China, because an American made Nail cost 3 cents but a Chinese made nail costs 1 cent. And if China goes down, there won't be any nails. For anyone.

For want of a nail...

There are fastener manufacturers in the US. Some quick googling shows about 20. Most today ARE manufactured in China, but it's not like a wizard cast a spell and the US magically lost the ability to manufacture anything.

 

[Sped Xing]

I'm not normally a pepper

Aren't pallets reusable in the US too? I know some will eventually break... but nails and wood isn't hard to make, and even a nigger should be able to fix it.

They could but they won't. I've never really understood why they don't send pallets back to the shipper for reuse since the trucks going back should be empty. For a while, people were actually taking discarded pallets and using them to make floors.
View attachment 2645462

Food grade pallets come in many "levels," but it really comes down to two types-- the blue (sometimes red) heavy painted pallets that last many trips, and the shittackular unpainted light pallets that break if stepped on, lifted wrong, or looked at funny. Guess which sort are more common.

Pallets can be repaired, of course, but you have to pay someone to repair them and buy the materials with which to repair them. This is mostly handled by specialty companies, but point being not "no pallets," but "pallets cost more." They're a small part of the cost of shipping food, but they are a part.

Honka correctly pointed out that pallets are usually gathered up for redistribution, not stuck onto the same truck to be returned to shipper. Because why? Because it's more efficient to have the truck pick up more food near where it just unloaded and take that somewhere else. Third party OTR is the main way things get anywhere.

A note about broken pallets-- as an example, Gordon Food Service charges the shipper 50 dollars for every broken pallet, and for every *previously repaired* pallet. That money ultimately comes out of the consumer's pocket. Sure, it's a bullshit fake charge, but so are mandatory lumpers and their 150 dollars to unload a damned truck.

The Fed hasn't raised interest rates because they can see all this inflation isn't overinvestment or the economy "heating up too much," but a massive reduction in the efficiency of the economy.

If they're expecting that inefficiency to work itself out, they haven't heard what Captain Mal had to say about middlemen.

Good thing we have the free market which will sort this out, obviously wages will rise dramatically for the truckers and stevedores so they'll be incentivized to come from across the country to clear the backlog, if only temporarily.

Have you SEEN freight prices lately? Truckers are making BANK. Most OTR drivers are paid either by a percentage of the load (all Owner Operators are paid this way, and many company drivers) or by the mile. There's no such thing as company loyalty, so mileage pay is more responsive than you might think, though it's not immediate like shares. Even the hourly driver is feeling the love. I just got a raise yesterday.

All these delays mean I get paid time and a half to make long, ill-informed posts on Kiwifarms.

 

[Phalanges Mycologist]

Aren't pallets reusable in the US too? I know some will eventually break... but nails and wood isn't hard to make, and even a nigger should be able to fix it.

It's not just the nails it's the wood to produce them, Nails are kind hard to explain but they are more production intensive than you think to produce, Machine made nails where a BIG deal in the industrial revolution because they are what smiths called "Penny Smalls" i.e. you made a lot of them they took up time and you only made a penny for your effort - pre and early industrial revolution periods nails where a really hot ticket item when it came to houses and boats upto the point if you where demolishing a house you'd take out anything of worth then burn it down to recover the nails and the same used to go for ships timbers you'd strip out anything that you could reliably resell and then burn the rest just to recover the nails.

Historically the first smithing job given a Smiths apprentice was normally nail making, it's simple, and teaches you a lot of useful skills like heat control, hot cutting and striking and by the time you've done you've leaned enough to move onto more serious tasks beacuse by then you've learned about Gang Production where you don't process a nail one at a time you do each section in a batch and then move onto the next etc, I think the standard for production as in work time was 4 to 6 nails a minute if we are talking basic cut nails 3 - 4 inches long and the smaller the nail the longer it took normally because you had to be more careful with your fire control and the tools used to make them where finer resulting in more errors.

Today the process is automated they feed the wire off spools, cut to lenght with a 2, 3 or 4 sided cutter drop them into a belt running them past a induction forge coil and hit them with a stamping head to form the head of the nail, they are then sent off for post forming operations like plating etc as needed, and that's going off a older way of doing it that I'm most familure with, there are more modern meathods of doing it but that's the automated process I am most aware of, and all the methods I am aware of require cheap and reliable sources of Steel wire and a awful lot of that comes from China where wire forming and drawing isn't as expensive.

The Common Agricultural Policy was ostensibly implemented to prevent food overproduction and ensure food price stability, to prevent farmers going bankrupt, but in reality it was implemented to protect French agriculture from competition, both from within the union and from outside of it.

The CAP was a shit show from the start and remained a shitshow throughout the many years of tweaking and lobbying that was done to it, the EU as a whole was set up to benefit two nations and two nations only and that's Germany and France everyone else in there eyes should just feel glad they are being brought along for the ride, but a lot of resentment is building up inside the EU towards that duopoly and it's only going to get worse as time goes on.

There are fastener manufacturers in the US. Some quick googling shows about 20. Most today ARE manufactured in China, but it's not like a wizard cast a spell and the US magically lost the ability to manufacture anything.

There are manufactures of fasteners in the US your right but they also tend to be more expensive pallets where considered disposable items and the price was set accordingly, I'm not sure how quickly those manufactures could scale up production to meet the increased demand, as I said above the main issue is cost for the item and supply of the raw stock with the backlog being what it is there might be supply's sitting off the coast waiting to go into nail production but can't because they can't reach the factory. JIT manufacturing can't deal with delays like we are seeing now and it's going to cost people dearly to recover.

 

[Sped Xing]

Is it too big of rainbows to think we'll see some more manufacturing return to America?

 

[Knight of the Rope]

I'm tired of pasta

It's just a flu, bro.

 

[Dog-O-Tron 5000v5.0]

View attachment 2647870

Lots of "Fun Pepper" energy in the world nowadays.