barriomulas.com - Invisible Subsidies

A recent Time Magazine article covering Taco Bell's expansion into the Mexican market noted that the stores' taco shells are imported from abroad. Such ironic contradictions are not rare; recently I purchased a set of Puerto Rican Taino statues only to see a "made in China" sticker under each piece. Even avocados, beans, rice, and plantains - important components of the traditional Puerto Rican diet - are imported from neighbors and distant sources alike.

One evening while on a lengthy flight I decided to occupy my time by mapping the "made in..." locations mentioned on each and every one of the food products on in complementary airline dinner tray.

I concluded that it would have been just as productive for me to scribble all over the entire sheet. The lettuce (Mexico), bread (U.S), sesame seeds (India), beef (Argentina), cheese (Germany), ketchup (China), and other ingredients on your average hamburger have been packed, shipped, and flown for thousands of miles in a complex arrangement that would be unimaginable before the age of globalization.

Globalists claim that such an array of crisscrossing trade lines is in fact a representation of free markets looking for their most efficient outlets. Though there is a sort of cultural contradiction and theoretical inefficiency, often it is at times more economic to import produce from half way across the world than it is to grow it next door.

Despite this, I argue that just because it is economically viable, does not mean that it is the most efficient solution. Though I can cheaply import rice and from distant countries, these cheap trade routes are often subsidized by and endless list of hidden and invisible externalities - most of which are not calculated in traditional GNP statistics. The negative effects on our health caused by an increasingly shrinking variety of dietary species; the cost of a society shifting towards a high-calorie diet; the public dollars spent on roads and ports; the effect fossil fuel usage has on air quality and water; and the wars needed to reclaim and protect oil fields are never factored into the price of your average everyday imported good. Instead, we often pay for it with our public welfare and tax dollars.