[WarOnPrivacy]

> It's insane how little I know about food economics and scary how much of an impact it has on communities, especially impoverished ones.

America mostly stopped caring about the welfare of rural Americans sometime around WWII. There have been some brief blips (Appalachia 68, farms 78) but generally - concern for Americans to sustain themselves ends at the edge of metro areas. Neither pols, nor press nor most of us are interested in a meaningful way.

To be clear, my assertion isn't an invitation to pit the rural poor against the urban poor. It's to highlight how Americans tend to be particular about which Americans merit their concern. For schlubs like me, that might be understandable. But for those folks who's actual job it is to look out for everyone - rarely caring about the welfare of some Americans (who are in real and sustained trouble) is just systemic neglect.

[ska]

> Neither pols, nor press nor most of us are interested in a meaningful way.

I'm not sure that's true - it's just that overall people are much more interested in cheap food. Agriculture has been pulled into a race for the bottom here for a while, and small farms & rural communities are a nearly unavoidable casualty.

The basic math here is easy, the moment labor becomes a significant contribution there is pressure to reduce it, which means either worse pay for the same work, or figuring out how to be more productive with less labor (automation, scaling) or a mixture of both.

Overall there is a lot of concern with being able to keep a food supply going, but that doesn't' translate to caring about e.g. family farms remaining viable.