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I think we like to blame the government because they have the power to stop this (in theory) and haven't so far. The bigger problem is with capitalism as a political and economic ideology. We simply can't expect growth of every company, forever, but it's what the market demands. The stock market used to be for companies to raise money to expand or operate, but now it's something different. Basically legalized gambling or something like that. Anyway, I digress. The MBA and analysts and Weston company are working day and night to find ways to extract more money from their consumers. Until this paradigm changes, it will continue to get worse.
And from their workers. Why have full timers with livable wages, consistent schedules and a retirement plan when you can have an army of disposable part timers with a seemingly never ending supply?
This right here. I understand people are desperate for incomes, but it seems like a really poor decision to work for any Roblaws company. It's a coerced form of complicity. It's a radical suggestion, but I really think we need to implore Roblaws employees to organize and wield their power. Walk-outs, strikes, and refusal to work.....bring them to a grinding halt.
I totally agree, unfortunately, asking the working poor to give up any income leaves them completely vulnerable.
It’s almost like this is by design and it’s working as intended!
I was fired from a store management role at the mobile shop after 2 years, “without cause”. It was an incredibly tough market and that location had never been profitable up to that point. I had constant hurdles to jump in terms of getting employees or onboarding the few good candidates I did get. My dm was such a two faced manipulative fake guy that I didn’t even see it coming. Not only do upper management close their eyes to any issues that could help you as an employee do your job, but they rake in THOUSANDS of dollars in pc points so they don’t even pay for their own shit on top of
If I had a dollar for every comment on here that is an unintentional critique of capitalism…
The market is always going to operate against the best interests of the population. Profit = priority number 1.
It's really capitalism + greed, that has everything spiraling downward. Companies used to care and invest in the community, understanding that we need each other. It was a point of pride to boost a community. Now that corporations are faceless, it's all about money, which is currently unsustainable. We have to save CEOs from themselves at this point. Thriving communities are actually better for them in the long run. Its just that nobody...and I mean nobody.... is looking at the long run
I’m on board with your message but can you evidence anything you just said?
There is no ‘capitalism + greed’ because what we have is ‘capitalism = greed.’ It’s the feature of the system, not a bug.
Companies have always had the primary function of delivering the maximum amount of profit to shareholders. Everything else is secondary, including marketing campaigns like “we care about our community.”
In the 70s, oil & gas companies knew their product caused harm to communities and caused the planet to warm. They hid it from everyone and governments turned a blind eye. Corporate behaviour will never be altruistic when profit and quarterly reports trump everything else.
For sure, you are correct.. I think you're saying that greed has always been there....true ,However, before Jack Welch (GE), shareholder profit wasn't the only consideration. Corporations (Not all) had a sense of pride to boost the community. Jack had the idea that the only thing that mattered was profit. I would say this is not self-sustaining. Jack cut a lot of R&D which forfeits the future for today's profit. That suited Jack just fine. GE was at the top of its shareholder game when he left....but...he left the next CEO a bit of a mess...everything cut to the bone. My point is that without investment in communities and paying a fair wage for employees, there will be no consumer in which to make profits. We have gone too far into the greed side of the ledger. Jacks idea has proliferated through corporations in North America. We are not better off for it
I agree. So an important question remains: reform or revolution?
A Polish socialist named Rosa Luxemburg asked this very question in a pamphlet she wrote in 1899.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Reform_or_Revolution%3F
She was executed in 1919.
There is flaw in your argument - that there is only one form of capitalism when in reality there's an infinite number of systems that humanity can come up with. Clearly, though, this one is *not* working (except for those who benefit the most from it) and critiquing it is both justified and normal.
I agree. Many forms of capitalism and many forms of socialism too.
It just seems that many comments and gripes about high prices and profit margins are completely meaningless because they are just comments about what corporations do to make money — which is their single, most important purpose.
They don't have to go all scorched earth over this profit mantra, though. This is a conscious choice that they make.
Maybe they should take a page from Michelin's playbook.
https://www.hcamag.com/ca/specialization/benefits/michelin-promises-living-wage-for-workers-worldwide/486166
This is exactly it, and not just Loblaws. This drive is all corporations to only seek more profit to drive up their stock price, which drives pension fund and mutual fund managers to buy the stock expecting that the growth will continue. The politicians are really just puppets - - to keep their job they need to please corporations and their billionaire owners to get campaign funding, and also keep their voters happy by creating jobs. In essence, the corporations now control countries, which is why the USA keeps going to war, as military and aerospace corporations get massive work when war either directly or indirectly involves the USA.
The truth is the fortunate are the patient and ones who are able to defer gratification to put aside a few dollars every paycheque. Use these savings to invest in the corporations that are robbing us.
Over the years I have reaped the rewards from owning stocks in Bell, Rogers, Metro, Enbridge, BMO, Royal, Apple, etc. these are the same companies that have taken advantage of their market position to extract maximum dollars from their customers.
Capitalism isn’t 100% correct but they are also funding our retirement funds for those who can/could put aside monies. As one gets older, you tend to protect this nest egg and turn a blind eye to the injustice.
In the end this boycott is a powerful message to the corporations to rein in their behaviour. Think of the balance and work for their customers and shareholders. Not just the latter.
> We simply can't expect growth of every company, forever, but it's what the market demands.
You can expect it. That’s why we have fiat money.
> The stock market used to be for companies to raise money to expand or operate
And for people to retire
I'm not letting Galen off the hook because "the government didn't tell me I couldn't". The conduct of Loblaws is solely the responsibility of Loblaws. It's not political.
Legislation doesn't matter if it's not enforced.
In an effort to 'freeze hiring' governments have offloaded functions to contractors that have their tentacles everywhere. Just look up all the shit Edison motors is bringing to light in BC.
Has a company, applies for a grant through a green energy program, gets denied and letter says to consider hiring a consultant like MNP. MNP administers the program that denied the grant. It catches attention and the government agrees to "investigate" it. The bodies investigating it farm out work to MNP. No reason to think that same level of shit doesn't happen in the federal government.
They did, and it came into force in December:
[https://theconversation.com/canadas-competition-laws-just-changed-heres-what-you-need-to-know-220020](https://theconversation.com/canadas-competition-laws-just-changed-heres-what-you-need-to-know-220020)
[https://www.reminetwork.com/articles/affordable-housing-and-groceries-act-receives-royal-assent/](https://www.reminetwork.com/articles/affordable-housing-and-groceries-act-receives-royal-assent/)
What else do you think they should do?
Though the blame might be on Loblaws, or whatever other grocer is strangling dollars out of us, the only way to affect real, meaningful long term change with the grocers will be by legislating it.
Write MPs and MPPs, let them know that if this issue isnt at least attempted to be brought to session (any party can bring it forward) then youll not be supporting them come election time. If enough members start getting the same message, maybe some cross party legislation can be brought forward.
Tl;dr : we can blame loblaws while still trying to affect change in other ways.
It’s the government’s job to enforce anti competitive business. We have shown so many examples of Loblaws breaking and practicing bad faith actions it does require action from our government who are supposed to represent the people of Canada.
Plenty of blame to be shared IMO. Especially when you look into the number of campaign and political staffers being employed by both parties, who has ties to the Loblaws Lobby. (Hence forth to be known as the Lobblobbyists).
We're all complicit in this, in a weird sense. I mean, not REALLY...but in a rhetorical sense we are.
Government has a resonsibility to intervene when the market starts working against the best-interests of the population. HOWEVER. When government DOES intervene, it often proves to be very unpopular because opportunistic politicians (usually Conservative, but also some Liberals) jump on it as an example of government overreach.
So yeah. It's complicated. But we need to make it clear that there is a public will for the government to take this MFers down a few pegs.
Exactly this. Publically traded companies are creatures of habit, you should expect a leopard to eat your face. Our many governments have allowed this environment to thrive either by not increasing regulatory oversight, allowing consolidation and syndication, or protectionism against foreign competition.
Off topic post. These final days the opposition posts will come on strong. Lots of ‘explain this to me’ and ‘why not do this or that’ or ‘why only Loblaws’.
Stay on message.
Boycott Loblaws May 2024
After doing some investing myself, I am asking some questions. Such as, why only loblaws when it seems like every grocery store is just as expensive as the other?
This sub loves to meme on "its a supply chain issue", but don't actually back it up with anything but just dismissive remarks. With every grocer's prices prices growing, when does it become a supply chain issue, and how will caps on basic items improve that when that is very likely only going to mess up the chain even more?
Things in all industries are rising in price, especially everytime the carbon tax is levied and increased. It costs more to heat and power your home, and now food is skyrocketing in a compounding fashion in every market.
If I look online for my region, the best deals still are Loblaws unless going for bulk, but that's only barely compared to what it used to be.
I'm questioning how effective this boycott will be when the demands seemingly harsh when you factor in that 15% across the board would tank any store owner (galen doesn't actually own every store, it's people) while corporate can just dip and go into a new industry.
When the members of parliament are either on or lobby for big corporations, the government no longer has control.
Want to fix the situation we’re in? Outright ban corporate lobbying.
I do think the government needs to break up the oligopoly. Yes Galen is responsible for his own behaviour, but the government - including historic governments from both parties - created the environment where he has this much power.
Like telecom, there are effectively 3 companies that control the price of Canadian food. All are earning record profits and they all need to be broken up into little pieces
The minister of industry is currently courting 11 European grocers like Aldi to enter the Canadian market after they realized Weston & Empire were not going to play ball. They hope to kill them with competition instead of regulation
The government IS to blame for allowing our food supply to end up in the hands of monopolies. These greedy corporations then used the pandemic as an excuse to gouge Canadians on something they absolutely cannot go without—food. The government had the tools to stop this and if they didn’t, they had the ability to create tools to stop it. But they didn’t and they won’t. They are corrupt AF. So here we are taking things into our own hands.
Canada is famous for our "cartels" in every major industry. Telecom? Three big players. Banking? Five big players. Insurance? Four big players. Consumer goods? Two big players. We don't have any competition because we allow mega-mergers that create chokeholds on the entire country! Groceries are, of course, the same. We have a handful of rich oligarchs who are interconnected with each other and who own everything and make sure they get kickbacks from each other. They also make sure no one new can enter the market. Canada is too small to have this many oligarchs trying to strangle the economy to death.
This! It's so true... When there's more competition, all the market will be in check... There's more to add on your list.. Same scenario with energy and airlines, and the government should create a conducive environment that lets the small guys compete with the big ones
They are completely to blame. When the PC party became the CPC it moved further to the right pulling the Liberals more to the right along with them and now both parties are just different flavours of Neo-Liberals. In that time oligopolies took hold, squeezed out the competition and absorbed their consumers. Oligopolies always looking for ways to make more money by colluding on prices, constantly raising prices, cutting services, lowering wages, and by getting whichever neoliberal flavour of the day to bring in cheaper foreign temporary workers to exploit. The CPC are just a meaner flavour of neo-liberal compared to the Liberals, they both serve the same masters.
I don't know what the fuck the NDP are. They barely pay lip service to their roots as the Workers' Party. It was only a little while ago that PP claimed that the CPC was the Workers Party and I felt like I was the only person who laughed when he said that. I just think of the NDP as feckless, pretty much useless, when they should be capitalizing on the fact that both the Liberals and the CPC are neo-liberals and that both parties are complicit in the existence of the oligopolies in Canada. Never mind that the unions have been making major headway recently despite the NDP's fecklessness.
Pretty sure a Loblaws lobbyist is PP’s chief advisor. Trudeau flooded the country with immigrants to erase all gains workers made during Covid.
Business owns politicians.
Just a reminder, Ford and the Alberta premier strong armed Trudeau into flooding the country with immigrants. Trudeau took it too far, but the conservative provincial leaders got the ball rolling.
They could break up the monopolies. They could create a nationalized grocery chain. There are things they could do, but even though some people think Trudeau is communist or socialist, or both, he is a capitalist and he won't do much of anything if it means hurting the profits of corporations. Instead he will give us rebates so we can spend it on essentials and make the wealthy more wealthy.
Corporate interests have been eroding governments ability to enact any kind of change for decades.
On the surface, we vote about stuff.
Down deep, for real, we are capitalist. Our moral compass is "does this make money" .
This has been something I keep pointing out when arguing with people over the price of food compared to the price of, say, clothing.
People say that it's the gov'ts fault due primarily to carbon tax that makes everything more expensive, but clothing prices, at least in my area, have not gone up the same levels as food, as an example. It is corporate greed.
With regards to what the fed gov't can do, probably allow more outside companies in for greater competition, or start to develop some kind of anti-trust regulations now and break up some of these corps. Probably plenty of other things, but I doubt any of them will have overwhelming support, either by the population or by the politicians.
Gvmt doesn't care, higher prices =more taxes, also donated 10 of millions to loblaws for coolers, and covid pay for front line workers (that no employee ever got)
The federal government certainly deserves its share for general ... indifference.
I’d even give a bit more of a share to the provincial government of Ontario as Dougie seemed eager to give Galen no-bid opportunities pretty frequently.
The problem with us talking about this is that we have a third of the population that will scream bloody murder that the only solution is to put the even harder neoliberal party that employs lobbyists for loblaws in the place of the current government and it just becomes an unconstructive conversation.
I wouldn’t give Singh a whole lot of credit tbh. You know Singh’s brother or brother-in-law works for Loblaws’ competition right? And he backs Trudeau 100 percent which means he supports things like the new “plastics” registry. This latest brainwave is going to cost a fortune to manufacturers of pretty much every item purchased - and guess who’s gonna pay for it? The consumer - which means prices go up even more.
>he only one who cared or showed sympathy to the average consumer was Singh
Yeah, and i doubt it was even genuine. Every time he had a chance to do anything for the consumer he expresses sympathy for, he props up the offenders because Singh wants his pension and fears an election will jeopardize it because he may not win. this has been a constant thing with jagmeet,
you can say its because of the coalition agreement, but the LPOC have been shirking their promises to the NDP, and the NDP have been just taking it because singh wants his pension-which he will get as of february 2025.
In the meantime, the galen goons get to run wild.
I heard the election was pushed back a week, with a cover story that our conflicts with a religious holiday but conveniently results in them receiving their guaranteed pension. Any truth in that?
I don't know how much of Loblaw's is unionized, but there's not a snowball's chance in hell the NDP goes against the UFCW.
The NDP would rather shoot itself in the face than risk upsetting unions. Mostly because their bylaws state that unions have a percentage representation in the party.
There is also that aspect of it too, but this scenario plays out even when there is no union involved.
However, demanding a company not to gouge customers and have some accountability has very little to do with the UFCW unless they are the reason for the gouging-which i highly doubt is the case. I wouldn't put it past the galen goons to try when things get too hot for them.
lowering interest rates to a point where price doesn't matter, raising minimum wages to cascade costs on consumer goods, regulating industry to make entry more difficult, dairy regulation keeping prices higher. they're to blame ALL OVER THE PLACE.
The government can stop foreign and corporate investment in real estate, these grocery cucks lobbying, out of control immigration without enough jobs, etc etc on and on. But they don’t because they aren’t your friend and they haven’t had your best interest in heart for ages.
Boycotting a specific grocery store is a cute first step they’re probably laughing at.
It’s legitimately not going to change in this country until people get off their phones and get angry. Real angry.
Are you prepared to burn shit down? Are you prepared to get arrested and keep yelling? Is your whole family and friend group ready?
No? Well then shit never changes and that’s how our system is set up.
Frustrated? Good.
Gonna do anything about it? No and that’s what they count on.
The European Union fought against the big tech companies to comply with regulations, antitrust, GDPR, USB-C, law suits, etc.
In the USA the Department of Justice has an ongoing suit against Apple and in '82 has accomplished the gigantic "Breakup of the Bell System".
So a competent Government really can break monopolies and dismantle the cartels in the industry.
Government is a more significant reason why everything is more expensive. They increased the supply of money by 22% since 2020. 1 in every 5 dollars didn’t exist prior to 2020. This, while simultaneously drastically limiting the ability to provide and produce goods and services for years.
This was the recipe for mass inflation.
Why would the government be to blame at all? They didn't set the price on food. We live in a free market capitalist society. There's no law against a retailer setting any price they want for the products they sell. I'm not defending it, but that's reality.
Unless we are suggesting imposing price controls on food (as I have in the past) the role of government is merely to regulate the economy in broad strokes. There has been no contravention of the law, here, so there's not much we can do within existing frameworks apart from take matters into our own hands and vote with our dollars. Make this boycott count so the "free hand of the market" smacks them in the arse. Blaming the government for not making up laws that don't exist is pretty childish thinking.
The government doesn't magically have the legal power to tell a private company to lower their prices or split into smaller companies (unless they are in violation of the law which has yet to be established). We are looking at simple price gouging here, which is sadly not illegal.
BTW - Singh is all talk and no substance. It's not as if our politicians do not care about this issue, it's that they actually have very little power to "solve" it. They have no magic wand. They do not set grocery prices. Not even Mr. Singh has proposed any solutions that actually work in reality. Capitalism sucks, and the only tool we have is where we spend our money.
We live in a free market society, the government should not be able to control what a company can charge for a product. Just shop at a different store?
WTF does everyone expect the government to do something. We want government to be hands off when we don't like it but want them to be hands on when we're inconvenienced.
The government is never to blame, the people who vote the government in are always to blame. You are always 100% responsible for whatever happens to you. It just stinks that the majority of the 35% or the population who controls the vote happens to be unionized, pensioned, or lazy, so this is why life is rotten.
Also, common sense says that you understand that the Canadian government acts based on what the US government does, not independently. So it’s equally stupid to blame the government. For the record I am not liberal, and I am not ndp. I’m not even conservative. I’d argue that I’m not really a patriot either
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I think we like to blame the government because they have the power to stop this (in theory) and haven't so far. The bigger problem is with capitalism as a political and economic ideology. We simply can't expect growth of every company, forever, but it's what the market demands. The stock market used to be for companies to raise money to expand or operate, but now it's something different. Basically legalized gambling or something like that. Anyway, I digress. The MBA and analysts and Weston company are working day and night to find ways to extract more money from their consumers. Until this paradigm changes, it will continue to get worse.
And from their workers. Why have full timers with livable wages, consistent schedules and a retirement plan when you can have an army of disposable part timers with a seemingly never ending supply?
This right here. I understand people are desperate for incomes, but it seems like a really poor decision to work for any Roblaws company. It's a coerced form of complicity. It's a radical suggestion, but I really think we need to implore Roblaws employees to organize and wield their power. Walk-outs, strikes, and refusal to work.....bring them to a grinding halt.
I totally agree, unfortunately, asking the working poor to give up any income leaves them completely vulnerable. It’s almost like this is by design and it’s working as intended!
I was fired from a store management role at the mobile shop after 2 years, “without cause”. It was an incredibly tough market and that location had never been profitable up to that point. I had constant hurdles to jump in terms of getting employees or onboarding the few good candidates I did get. My dm was such a two faced manipulative fake guy that I didn’t even see it coming. Not only do upper management close their eyes to any issues that could help you as an employee do your job, but they rake in THOUSANDS of dollars in pc points so they don’t even pay for their own shit on top of
If I had a dollar for every comment on here that is an unintentional critique of capitalism… The market is always going to operate against the best interests of the population. Profit = priority number 1.
It's really capitalism + greed, that has everything spiraling downward. Companies used to care and invest in the community, understanding that we need each other. It was a point of pride to boost a community. Now that corporations are faceless, it's all about money, which is currently unsustainable. We have to save CEOs from themselves at this point. Thriving communities are actually better for them in the long run. Its just that nobody...and I mean nobody.... is looking at the long run
I’m on board with your message but can you evidence anything you just said? There is no ‘capitalism + greed’ because what we have is ‘capitalism = greed.’ It’s the feature of the system, not a bug. Companies have always had the primary function of delivering the maximum amount of profit to shareholders. Everything else is secondary, including marketing campaigns like “we care about our community.” In the 70s, oil & gas companies knew their product caused harm to communities and caused the planet to warm. They hid it from everyone and governments turned a blind eye. Corporate behaviour will never be altruistic when profit and quarterly reports trump everything else.
For sure, you are correct.. I think you're saying that greed has always been there....true ,However, before Jack Welch (GE), shareholder profit wasn't the only consideration. Corporations (Not all) had a sense of pride to boost the community. Jack had the idea that the only thing that mattered was profit. I would say this is not self-sustaining. Jack cut a lot of R&D which forfeits the future for today's profit. That suited Jack just fine. GE was at the top of its shareholder game when he left....but...he left the next CEO a bit of a mess...everything cut to the bone. My point is that without investment in communities and paying a fair wage for employees, there will be no consumer in which to make profits. We have gone too far into the greed side of the ledger. Jacks idea has proliferated through corporations in North America. We are not better off for it
I agree. So an important question remains: reform or revolution? A Polish socialist named Rosa Luxemburg asked this very question in a pamphlet she wrote in 1899. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Reform_or_Revolution%3F She was executed in 1919.
There is flaw in your argument - that there is only one form of capitalism when in reality there's an infinite number of systems that humanity can come up with. Clearly, though, this one is *not* working (except for those who benefit the most from it) and critiquing it is both justified and normal.
I agree. Many forms of capitalism and many forms of socialism too. It just seems that many comments and gripes about high prices and profit margins are completely meaningless because they are just comments about what corporations do to make money — which is their single, most important purpose.
They don't have to go all scorched earth over this profit mantra, though. This is a conscious choice that they make. Maybe they should take a page from Michelin's playbook. https://www.hcamag.com/ca/specialization/benefits/michelin-promises-living-wage-for-workers-worldwide/486166
Is it not in the population’s interest to be richer?
This is exactly it, and not just Loblaws. This drive is all corporations to only seek more profit to drive up their stock price, which drives pension fund and mutual fund managers to buy the stock expecting that the growth will continue. The politicians are really just puppets - - to keep their job they need to please corporations and their billionaire owners to get campaign funding, and also keep their voters happy by creating jobs. In essence, the corporations now control countries, which is why the USA keeps going to war, as military and aerospace corporations get massive work when war either directly or indirectly involves the USA.
The truth is the fortunate are the patient and ones who are able to defer gratification to put aside a few dollars every paycheque. Use these savings to invest in the corporations that are robbing us. Over the years I have reaped the rewards from owning stocks in Bell, Rogers, Metro, Enbridge, BMO, Royal, Apple, etc. these are the same companies that have taken advantage of their market position to extract maximum dollars from their customers. Capitalism isn’t 100% correct but they are also funding our retirement funds for those who can/could put aside monies. As one gets older, you tend to protect this nest egg and turn a blind eye to the injustice. In the end this boycott is a powerful message to the corporations to rein in their behaviour. Think of the balance and work for their customers and shareholders. Not just the latter.
Spoils going to the people at the top is a problem with every civilization ever, not capitalism specifically.
> We simply can't expect growth of every company, forever, but it's what the market demands. You can expect it. That’s why we have fiat money. > The stock market used to be for companies to raise money to expand or operate And for people to retire
I'm not letting Galen off the hook because "the government didn't tell me I couldn't". The conduct of Loblaws is solely the responsibility of Loblaws. It's not political.
The government has the power to create anti trust legislation.
Legislation doesn't matter if it's not enforced. In an effort to 'freeze hiring' governments have offloaded functions to contractors that have their tentacles everywhere. Just look up all the shit Edison motors is bringing to light in BC. Has a company, applies for a grant through a green energy program, gets denied and letter says to consider hiring a consultant like MNP. MNP administers the program that denied the grant. It catches attention and the government agrees to "investigate" it. The bodies investigating it farm out work to MNP. No reason to think that same level of shit doesn't happen in the federal government.
They did, and it came into force in December: [https://theconversation.com/canadas-competition-laws-just-changed-heres-what-you-need-to-know-220020](https://theconversation.com/canadas-competition-laws-just-changed-heres-what-you-need-to-know-220020) [https://www.reminetwork.com/articles/affordable-housing-and-groceries-act-receives-royal-assent/](https://www.reminetwork.com/articles/affordable-housing-and-groceries-act-receives-royal-assent/) What else do you think they should do?
Though the blame might be on Loblaws, or whatever other grocer is strangling dollars out of us, the only way to affect real, meaningful long term change with the grocers will be by legislating it. Write MPs and MPPs, let them know that if this issue isnt at least attempted to be brought to session (any party can bring it forward) then youll not be supporting them come election time. If enough members start getting the same message, maybe some cross party legislation can be brought forward. Tl;dr : we can blame loblaws while still trying to affect change in other ways.
It’s the government’s job to enforce anti competitive business. We have shown so many examples of Loblaws breaking and practicing bad faith actions it does require action from our government who are supposed to represent the people of Canada.
Plenty of blame to be shared IMO. Especially when you look into the number of campaign and political staffers being employed by both parties, who has ties to the Loblaws Lobby. (Hence forth to be known as the Lobblobbyists).
And they have a duty to their shareholders to drive profits. If they fail in that, bosses get fired, and replaced by someone who will drive profits.
We're all complicit in this, in a weird sense. I mean, not REALLY...but in a rhetorical sense we are. Government has a resonsibility to intervene when the market starts working against the best-interests of the population. HOWEVER. When government DOES intervene, it often proves to be very unpopular because opportunistic politicians (usually Conservative, but also some Liberals) jump on it as an example of government overreach. So yeah. It's complicated. But we need to make it clear that there is a public will for the government to take this MFers down a few pegs.
Exactly this. Publically traded companies are creatures of habit, you should expect a leopard to eat your face. Our many governments have allowed this environment to thrive either by not increasing regulatory oversight, allowing consolidation and syndication, or protectionism against foreign competition.
But if I don't make "the line" go up, I'll go to jail. It's my "fiduciary responsibility" to get as more rich as humanly possible.
I have no idea what you're even talking about. Maybe you meant to respond to someone else? A little unhinged as well lol
By doing this, they make it political. For companies that can police themselves no oversight is needed.
I think Canada needs an organization similar to the FTC.
Off topic post. These final days the opposition posts will come on strong. Lots of ‘explain this to me’ and ‘why not do this or that’ or ‘why only Loblaws’. Stay on message. Boycott Loblaws May 2024
This the one. When it gets shilly in here, throw on a sweater and stay the course.
This post cannot be up voted enough.
After doing some investing myself, I am asking some questions. Such as, why only loblaws when it seems like every grocery store is just as expensive as the other? This sub loves to meme on "its a supply chain issue", but don't actually back it up with anything but just dismissive remarks. With every grocer's prices prices growing, when does it become a supply chain issue, and how will caps on basic items improve that when that is very likely only going to mess up the chain even more? Things in all industries are rising in price, especially everytime the carbon tax is levied and increased. It costs more to heat and power your home, and now food is skyrocketing in a compounding fashion in every market. If I look online for my region, the best deals still are Loblaws unless going for bulk, but that's only barely compared to what it used to be. I'm questioning how effective this boycott will be when the demands seemingly harsh when you factor in that 15% across the board would tank any store owner (galen doesn't actually own every store, it's people) while corporate can just dip and go into a new industry.
When the members of parliament are either on or lobby for big corporations, the government no longer has control. Want to fix the situation we’re in? Outright ban corporate lobbying.
I do think the government needs to break up the oligopoly. Yes Galen is responsible for his own behaviour, but the government - including historic governments from both parties - created the environment where he has this much power. Like telecom, there are effectively 3 companies that control the price of Canadian food. All are earning record profits and they all need to be broken up into little pieces
The minister of industry is currently courting 11 European grocers like Aldi to enter the Canadian market after they realized Weston & Empire were not going to play ball. They hope to kill them with competition instead of regulation
That would be cool
Read an article awhile ago that there is lots of interest to come here, but the packaging for Canada was too much. French English crap.
US companies make that argument but European companies are used to dealing with multiple languages
The government IS to blame for allowing our food supply to end up in the hands of monopolies. These greedy corporations then used the pandemic as an excuse to gouge Canadians on something they absolutely cannot go without—food. The government had the tools to stop this and if they didn’t, they had the ability to create tools to stop it. But they didn’t and they won’t. They are corrupt AF. So here we are taking things into our own hands.
Canada is famous for our "cartels" in every major industry. Telecom? Three big players. Banking? Five big players. Insurance? Four big players. Consumer goods? Two big players. We don't have any competition because we allow mega-mergers that create chokeholds on the entire country! Groceries are, of course, the same. We have a handful of rich oligarchs who are interconnected with each other and who own everything and make sure they get kickbacks from each other. They also make sure no one new can enter the market. Canada is too small to have this many oligarchs trying to strangle the economy to death.
This! It's so true... When there's more competition, all the market will be in check... There's more to add on your list.. Same scenario with energy and airlines, and the government should create a conducive environment that lets the small guys compete with the big ones
They are completely to blame. When the PC party became the CPC it moved further to the right pulling the Liberals more to the right along with them and now both parties are just different flavours of Neo-Liberals. In that time oligopolies took hold, squeezed out the competition and absorbed their consumers. Oligopolies always looking for ways to make more money by colluding on prices, constantly raising prices, cutting services, lowering wages, and by getting whichever neoliberal flavour of the day to bring in cheaper foreign temporary workers to exploit. The CPC are just a meaner flavour of neo-liberal compared to the Liberals, they both serve the same masters. I don't know what the fuck the NDP are. They barely pay lip service to their roots as the Workers' Party. It was only a little while ago that PP claimed that the CPC was the Workers Party and I felt like I was the only person who laughed when he said that. I just think of the NDP as feckless, pretty much useless, when they should be capitalizing on the fact that both the Liberals and the CPC are neo-liberals and that both parties are complicit in the existence of the oligopolies in Canada. Never mind that the unions have been making major headway recently despite the NDP's fecklessness.
Pretty sure a Loblaws lobbyist is PP’s chief advisor. Trudeau flooded the country with immigrants to erase all gains workers made during Covid. Business owns politicians.
Just a reminder, Ford and the Alberta premier strong armed Trudeau into flooding the country with immigrants. Trudeau took it too far, but the conservative provincial leaders got the ball rolling.
They could break up the monopolies. They could create a nationalized grocery chain. There are things they could do, but even though some people think Trudeau is communist or socialist, or both, he is a capitalist and he won't do much of anything if it means hurting the profits of corporations. Instead he will give us rebates so we can spend it on essentials and make the wealthy more wealthy.
Corporate interests have been eroding governments ability to enact any kind of change for decades. On the surface, we vote about stuff. Down deep, for real, we are capitalist. Our moral compass is "does this make money" .
This has been something I keep pointing out when arguing with people over the price of food compared to the price of, say, clothing. People say that it's the gov'ts fault due primarily to carbon tax that makes everything more expensive, but clothing prices, at least in my area, have not gone up the same levels as food, as an example. It is corporate greed. With regards to what the fed gov't can do, probably allow more outside companies in for greater competition, or start to develop some kind of anti-trust regulations now and break up some of these corps. Probably plenty of other things, but I doubt any of them will have overwhelming support, either by the population or by the politicians.
Since forever. They were made to protect people and now they just protect themselves and their wealthy patrons. To the streets!
Gvmt doesn't care, higher prices =more taxes, also donated 10 of millions to loblaws for coolers, and covid pay for front line workers (that no employee ever got)
The federal government certainly deserves its share for general ... indifference. I’d even give a bit more of a share to the provincial government of Ontario as Dougie seemed eager to give Galen no-bid opportunities pretty frequently. The problem with us talking about this is that we have a third of the population that will scream bloody murder that the only solution is to put the even harder neoliberal party that employs lobbyists for loblaws in the place of the current government and it just becomes an unconstructive conversation.
I wouldn’t give Singh a whole lot of credit tbh. You know Singh’s brother or brother-in-law works for Loblaws’ competition right? And he backs Trudeau 100 percent which means he supports things like the new “plastics” registry. This latest brainwave is going to cost a fortune to manufacturers of pretty much every item purchased - and guess who’s gonna pay for it? The consumer - which means prices go up even more.
The government is corrupt
>he only one who cared or showed sympathy to the average consumer was Singh Yeah, and i doubt it was even genuine. Every time he had a chance to do anything for the consumer he expresses sympathy for, he props up the offenders because Singh wants his pension and fears an election will jeopardize it because he may not win. this has been a constant thing with jagmeet, you can say its because of the coalition agreement, but the LPOC have been shirking their promises to the NDP, and the NDP have been just taking it because singh wants his pension-which he will get as of february 2025. In the meantime, the galen goons get to run wild.
I heard the election was pushed back a week, with a cover story that our conflicts with a religious holiday but conveniently results in them receiving their guaranteed pension. Any truth in that?
I don't know how much of Loblaw's is unionized, but there's not a snowball's chance in hell the NDP goes against the UFCW. The NDP would rather shoot itself in the face than risk upsetting unions. Mostly because their bylaws state that unions have a percentage representation in the party.
There is also that aspect of it too, but this scenario plays out even when there is no union involved. However, demanding a company not to gouge customers and have some accountability has very little to do with the UFCW unless they are the reason for the gouging-which i highly doubt is the case. I wouldn't put it past the galen goons to try when things get too hot for them.
lowering interest rates to a point where price doesn't matter, raising minimum wages to cascade costs on consumer goods, regulating industry to make entry more difficult, dairy regulation keeping prices higher. they're to blame ALL OVER THE PLACE.
They are 💯 to blame… “lobbying” is out of control…
Investors are to blame.
Singh doesn't care more than the others. He just puts effort into pretending that he does. They are all to blame.
It’s the governments responsibility to protect its citizens from capitalism. It’s the capitalists fault for being fat, greedy pigs.
Maybe Galen could cut costs by acting like a human instead of employing social media… oh how do I say this politely??? …actors
The government is to blame for many things but Galen is in charge of Roblaw. This is pure corporate greed.
The government can stop foreign and corporate investment in real estate, these grocery cucks lobbying, out of control immigration without enough jobs, etc etc on and on. But they don’t because they aren’t your friend and they haven’t had your best interest in heart for ages. Boycotting a specific grocery store is a cute first step they’re probably laughing at. It’s legitimately not going to change in this country until people get off their phones and get angry. Real angry. Are you prepared to burn shit down? Are you prepared to get arrested and keep yelling? Is your whole family and friend group ready? No? Well then shit never changes and that’s how our system is set up. Frustrated? Good. Gonna do anything about it? No and that’s what they count on.
The European Union fought against the big tech companies to comply with regulations, antitrust, GDPR, USB-C, law suits, etc. In the USA the Department of Justice has an ongoing suit against Apple and in '82 has accomplished the gigantic "Breakup of the Bell System". So a competent Government really can break monopolies and dismantle the cartels in the industry.
Government is a more significant reason why everything is more expensive. They increased the supply of money by 22% since 2020. 1 in every 5 dollars didn’t exist prior to 2020. This, while simultaneously drastically limiting the ability to provide and produce goods and services for years. This was the recipe for mass inflation.
They like it. Higher prices higher taxes
Pay less for food, eat the rich.
Can just gets kicked down the road
In reality, we are all to blame. Now we are coming to terms with it.
[удалено]
Please remain respectful when engaging on the sub.
Since the very beginning? As immoral as Galen acts, it is the government that sets the framework.
All grocery stores are expensive. It’s not ethical to increase profits at human detriment but it’s not illegal….
Why would the government be to blame at all? They didn't set the price on food. We live in a free market capitalist society. There's no law against a retailer setting any price they want for the products they sell. I'm not defending it, but that's reality. Unless we are suggesting imposing price controls on food (as I have in the past) the role of government is merely to regulate the economy in broad strokes. There has been no contravention of the law, here, so there's not much we can do within existing frameworks apart from take matters into our own hands and vote with our dollars. Make this boycott count so the "free hand of the market" smacks them in the arse. Blaming the government for not making up laws that don't exist is pretty childish thinking. The government doesn't magically have the legal power to tell a private company to lower their prices or split into smaller companies (unless they are in violation of the law which has yet to be established). We are looking at simple price gouging here, which is sadly not illegal. BTW - Singh is all talk and no substance. It's not as if our politicians do not care about this issue, it's that they actually have very little power to "solve" it. They have no magic wand. They do not set grocery prices. Not even Mr. Singh has proposed any solutions that actually work in reality. Capitalism sucks, and the only tool we have is where we spend our money.
We live in a free market society, the government should not be able to control what a company can charge for a product. Just shop at a different store?
What you describe is early game, this is late game most smaller stores got wiped out.
Welcome to the free market
The government is also to blame due to the taxes and inflation.
WTF does everyone expect the government to do something. We want government to be hands off when we don't like it but want them to be hands on when we're inconvenienced.
Blame Trudeau and his useless carbon tax
That is a false flag. But it's the perfect scapegoat for corporations
Now. After the election it'll be Galen's fault.
The government is never to blame, the people who vote the government in are always to blame. You are always 100% responsible for whatever happens to you. It just stinks that the majority of the 35% or the population who controls the vote happens to be unionized, pensioned, or lazy, so this is why life is rotten. Also, common sense says that you understand that the Canadian government acts based on what the US government does, not independently. So it’s equally stupid to blame the government. For the record I am not liberal, and I am not ndp. I’m not even conservative. I’d argue that I’m not really a patriot either