New at Reason: Ron Bailey on Rising Food Prices

What's the cause of rising food prices? As Science Correspondent Ronald Bailey explains, the problem isn't overpopulation, it's government failure.

Read all about it here.

Comments

prolefeed | July 8, 2008, 3:44pm | #

The problem is that the ability to get elected to office, and the ability to understand economics, are often unrelated skill sets, and at worst mutually exclusive.

Banning food exports to prevent hunger is one of the most braindead, counterproductive examples. Assume we cut off imported food and banned interstate sales of food in the U.S. "for teh children" -- food exporters like California and Iowa and Washington would produce less, while states like Arizona would suffer mass emigration to prevent starvation.

Naga Sadow | July 8, 2008, 3:59pm | #

I've long stated that ECO 101 and ECO 102 should be required for all majors. Also should be a requirement for high school graduation. Granted it would take roughly 10 years to have a discernable impact but I believe it would make a difference.

stuartl | July 8, 2008, 4:10pm | #

Well-fed human beings can evidently override the genetic programming that drives other animals to turn more food into more offspring.

I'm not sure if it is really true that humans are the only animal that does not respond to food abundance by having more offspring. This article suggests that one evolutionary strategy is to produce fitter and/or larger offspring in response to food abundance. In the US, where the goal is frequently to get your kid into the best kindergarten, this seems to be a common strategy.

I have no idea the level of research in the area, but am suspicious (especially when used in a political context) of this kind of generalization about the uniqueness of humans.

Douglas Gray | July 8, 2008, 4:33pm | #

In Zimbabwe, the country has gone from being a huge agricultural exporter(When it was called Rhodesia) to a typical starving African nation, all due to government corruption.

However, Bailey gives an incomplete picture. It is not all due to governments. Australia has also gone from being a huge exporter to a country which must import, but it's due to drought and other weather factors, not government ineptitude.

Cosmotarian Overlord | July 8, 2008, 4:45pm | #

oh please, the problem is just insane speculation. what we need is a market based cap and trade program for carbon dioxide. That will be the most effective free market way to lower food prices.

Ryan Langrill | July 8, 2008, 5:00pm | #

One thing missing, perhaps one of the biggest things, is the drastic increase in commodity market trading, as shown here, in Michael Masters's testimony before congress.
http://hsgac.senate.gov/public/_files/052008Masters.pdf (warning, this is a pdf file. Don't be scared)

What even he doesn't get at, though, is why people are investing in commodity markets so much. Traditionally, in a Capitalist system, prices drop as production gets more efficient, meaning to invest in commodities was to invest in something you know will lose money. The same thing should be happening; there is no drastic shortage in coffee, for instance, and there should be no reason for anyone to invest in commodities.

But for the fiat currency. Prices are increasing above and beyond what they should, given inflation, because investors know that there will be inflation. The answer isn't to restrict the commodity markets, but to [i]fix the dollar[/i]. The food price increase is the result of this cascade effect, much more so than the increased demand due to biofuel is. Granted, if this can kill biofuel legislation, hooray for the ancillary benefits, but undo no circumstance, given a stable money supply, should this happen.

Antiglobalism | July 8, 2008, 5:20pm | #

Overpopulation means more consumers, means more speculation for food, means higher food prices, but basically, the recent price spikes were caused by the biofuel industry.

Why biofuel? Easy, the global food companies are lobbying this through to take control over the future energy assets. It's globalism, simple math.

Chad | July 8, 2008, 5:39pm | #

I have no idea the level of research in the area, but am suspicious (especially when used in a political context) of this kind of generalization about the uniqueness of humans.

We actually quite unique in one way - birth control. It is the reason for the population decline that is setting in throughout the industrialized world. Simply put, humans (and other species) evolved two powerful emotions that caused our populations to grow if resources existed: the desire to have sex, and the desire to fiercely protect our children. What we did NOT evolve was a desire to HAVE children, which was unnecessary if sex led directly to children. With birth control, however, sex does NOT usually lead to children unless we choose to let it.

Birth control has circumvented our normal reproduction pathway. While being a great thing that allows great freedom for us all, birth control appears to be leading us towards inevitable population decline unless something else changes.

As Ron noted, we already have the food to feed 10 billion...more than will ever exist at once according to the UN. Overpopulation is simply not a global issue, though it can be a local one.

StupendousMan | July 8, 2008, 5:43pm | #

"...we already have the food to feed 10 billion...more than will ever exist at once according to the UN. Overpopulation is simply not a global issue..."

I didn't realize that the UN employed psychics.

Rhywun | July 8, 2008, 5:52pm | #

I've long stated that ECO 101 and ECO 102 should be required for all majors.

It was at my college (SUNY Buffalo). Well, 101 was required. And I hated every minute of it.

Cosmotarian Overlord | July 8, 2008, 6:32pm | #

Ryan Langrill,

You almost had me. Everything you said made so much sense. But then I got to thinking why is the dollar being mismangaged. Then I remembered that it is the Fed's job to control the price of money(interest rates) and this is the main lever they are using to control inflation ....so your saying the Fed is doing a bad job? By implication this means that you are against the Fed?! then I figured it out...you are a anti-semite conspiracy theorist trying to spread your poison ideology. I know the Fed has nothing but humanities best interest at heart and we have to have a Fed managing our currency and this has been proven to be the BEST monetary system....if you think otherwise you are a nutcase.

You sound like that loon ron paul arguing with all the grownups at the debates with his wacky monetary theories.

If libertarians want to get anywhere we need to lay off the crazy pills and make the arguments of broader appeal like for gay rights advocacy etc. This is the future of libertarianism.

Hugo Pottisch | July 8, 2008, 7:33pm | #

Well.. in the short-run.. right now... ethanol and high oil prices due to bad policies and no shortages per se are the main reasons for our woes.. and in the long-run we are all dead anyway.

A worst case scenarios from the the 60s has not materialized and suddenly all environmentalists are doom-seers who just do not get economics 101. Let us forget that MOST predictions about the population doubling every couple of years have come true. Same is true for MOST environmental predictions - that conditions would get worse, species loss, erosion, climate change etc.)

Technology and more market efficiency will do the trick. E O Wilson does not understand this when he warns about species loss etc? Here a glimpse.

The market must be free to function - it is too complex and organic to be controlled by the state - we would only pay a dead-weight loss in case of regulations, interferecne, taxes and subsidies - laissez faire..

but nature.. ah nature we can approached like a machine or factory. we can "fix" it with better tech.. with better GMOs for example!

we are obviously mixing up a lot of different arguments together for convenience reasons. Yes - GMOs can help feed more people for some time. And? Yes - market policies are better than stupid statist policies. And?

What about the degeneration of our only ecosystem and the threat to the happiness and prosperity that our technological and economical revolutions have enabled?

What good is it to get 100% more out per acer when the ecosystem still reaches an ecological point-of-no-return?

Dear Reason Team - please explain to us why you are so confident that given that we deploy GMO (more unnatural intervention with nature) and free market-policies - nature would be saved.

Until a year ago the instinctive response to the ecological challenge was: technology will save us! This is what E O Wilson argued decades ago. Nowadays the instinct shouts: transparent pricing and markets will safe us. Ask a jeweler and jewels will safe us!

Come on guys. It is how we think about nature and not merely what policies we apply. Of course stupid statist policies are not the best way for health care, education and the environment. But that does not make an economist a better environmentalist.

Explain to us how nature works and why we do not have anything to worry about anything as long as we stay economically libertarian but not ecologically. Ecological libertarians are worse to economical libertarians than the worst statists. Economical and ecological libertarians are to economical-only-types like an oxymoron. As if somebody cannot be good looking and rich at the same time or somethin... pathetic! Almost anti-American I might dare to say ;-)

Gabe Harris | July 8, 2008, 8:13pm | #

http://www.accountabilitynowpac.com/

ok people...we all disagree on lots of stuff...but please tell me Reason will at least put their name on the list supporting the break-the-matrix-Glenn Greenwald....peaceful democrat, anti-war libertarian, liberty caucus republican effort to make sure they do not pass immunity laws for the illegal eavesdropping that some of the phone companies have been co-conspirators in?


Is Reason going to participate...the cosmos and paleos can work together on some things right? isn't this in all of our best interest? Ayn Randian, I will promise not to do any "cosmotarian overlord" for one week if you just pledge $5 to the cause...issues specific efforts can help us regain our freedom ....this is what the internet can help us do.

Naga Sadow | July 8, 2008, 8:25pm | #

Aresen,

I agree. I'm something of a dreamer, I guess. What I would like to get across to most people is the consequence factor. EVERYTHING has a consequence. When you get right down to economics, everything seems to come down to resource management. More of one thing will inevitably lead to less of something else.

stuartl | July 8, 2008, 9:01pm | #

We actually quite unique in one way - birth control. It is the reason for the population decline that is setting in throughout the industrialized world.

Do you have any sources/data to back this? I have vague recollections that some species change their fertility depending on circumstances, but really can't recall. Not all methods of birth control require technology or deep thought.

Chad | July 8, 2008, 9:51pm | #

"Do you have any sources/data to back this? I have vague recollections that some species change their fertility depending on circumstances, but really can't recall. Not all methods of birth control require technology or deep thought."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sub-replacement_fertility

The US is just below break-even now. Just about every other industrialized nation is well below the replacement rate. Most industrializing nations are experiencing rapidly decling birthrates. The only places with birthrates well above replacement levels are impoverished nations with little education and access to birth control. As these nations move towards industrialization and modern society, their birthrates are expected to drop as well.

Europe has managed to staunch the bleeding and has more or less stopped the decline in its birth rate, but has not gotten it to move up towards replacement. Places like Japand and Korea are far below replacement and only getting worse.

The UN's official projections (based on peer-reviewed social science and economics, not crystal balls) predicts a maximum population of 9-10 billion sometime in latter part of this century.

Simply put, well-educated people with access to birth control are choosing to not have enough children to ensure a stable population. Barring some technological or political change, population decline is inevitable. It is also undesirable...fewer people may cause the remaining survivors to be a bit better off, but nowhere near enough to offset the losses of those who were not born in the first place. The reason for this is pretty simple. Broadly speaking, the next person born on this planet will affect our total human happiness in three ways:

1: He or she will have his or her own happiness, adding to the total

2: He or she will collaborate and interact with his or her friends, family, coworkers, and customers in many ways, most of them beneficial

3: He or she will decrease everyone's share of the world's natural resources

Until the third effect is large enough to offset the first two, adding an additional person creates more happiness for humanity as a whole. It is extremely unlikely that we are anywhere near this point.

oleg | July 9, 2008, 5:47am | #

Ron,

ok - 7 billions is not the limit.

But what is your estimate? Do you think there are some limitations or not at all?

Thanks.

stuartl | July 9, 2008, 8:52am | #

Chad,

While your article discusses contraception, it also says -- "Another, perhaps simpler explanation, could be a reduction in the frequency of sex in populations with low birth rates."

There is no doubt that contraception has some effect on population, but is it the only or even the primary cause of slowing population growth? The neo-Malthusian assumption that for all animals more food equals more offspring may be simplistic. For some species (including humans?), the response to abundance might be fitter offspring, not more offspring. I am no expert, but a quick internet search gives a few examples similar to the research I linked to above.

R C Dean | July 9, 2008, 10:46am | #

Let us forget that MOST predictions about the population doubling every couple of years have come true.

Erm, not really. The population has never doubled every couple of years, and the Malthusian doomsday projections of the '70s were fundamentally flawed because they assumed compound, rather than linear, growth rates.

Same is true for MOST environmental predictions - that conditions would get worse, species loss, erosion, climate change etc.)

I would say that it is a very, very mixed bag here. The most extreme environmental predictions have almost never borne out in the long run. Some of the more moderate ones have. Including "climate change" in this list is pretty risible, really. The "coming ice age" predictions have certainly fallen into the memory hole, no? The current 8-9 year plateau in global average temperatures was certainly never predicted either.

Sam-hec | July 9, 2008, 12:31pm | #

"Barring some technological or political change, population decline is inevitable."

I am rooting for personal-replacement-cloning and cybernetics to make the issue moot. Offworld asteroid mining will make mineral shortages moot; and O'Neil colonies will make Biodiversity Earth's best resource (biosamples don't weigh much). Biodiversity is thus worth preserving.

"The "coming ice age" predictions have certainly fallen into the memory hole, no? "

I realize you said 'environmental predictions' without stating who made these prediction. These were largely the product of the media (newsweek et al), not the climate scientists; there were a total of about 7 peer reviewed science papers from the '70s which suggested a more or less imminent Ice Age (without being misquoted etc., NewsWeek et al, started the trend with misquotes and bad reporting from two papers); there were many many more peer reviewed science articles predicting warming from the same period.

"The current 8-9 year plateau in global average temperatures was certainly never predicted either."

I disagree. Basing the 'plateau' from the 1998 spike, not from the real multi-year trend line from the same time is a common mistake. And we are currently in a temperature pit due to both La Nina and a trough in a solar cycle, neither of which actually detract from the still positive longer term (10.5 year) temperature trend.

Until the third effect is large enough to offset the first two, adding an additional person creates more happiness for humanity as a whole. It is extremely unlikely that we are anywhere near this point.


Not necessarily, go Offworld, and soon. The only thing lacking out-there is life.

"Not all methods of birth control require technology or deep thought"

Deep Thought proved limited in answers...it was the questions which needed to be nailed down first (and glued, taped, stapled, etc) I mean really, 42 what? Children? Best weight in Kilos?

Terry | July 16, 2008, 9:46am | #

stuartl:"Do you have any sources/data to back this? I have ...".
I'm interested, too.
Would be great if you could send me some data.
Nice article and comments.

KenK | July 18, 2008, 5:05pm | #

http://michellemalkin.com/2008/07/18/food-crisis-global-depression-worsens/

When somebody yells famine I want to see skinny people - not tub-o-lard people.

Reminds me of what one guy said about why he wanted to get into the USA any way he could:

I want to go to a country where the poor people are FAT!