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The US is becoming a net importer of food.

Which is wild, because the US has probably the most high-quality farmland per person of any country on the planet. WHAT ARE WE DOING HERE FOLKS???

https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-statistics-charting-the-essentials/agricultural-trade

And why?

Most people who are talking about this blame it on either trade policy, "too many regulations," or both. US farms & food companies just can't compete, you see. Therefore we must have trade barriers to food imports and drop labor & environmental protections.

The thing is... none of that is true.

I'm a logistics consultant for farms & food facilities. And I'm telling you making food is VERY profitable! Already!

So what's the real problem?

People who have the land & capital to make food would rather be real estate developers.

That's it. That's the whole problem.

"So development must be more profitable than food & farming, right?"

Not necessarily! Well run farms should make 5-10% annual profit when you average out good & bad years. That can be less than real estate (10-15%). But it's a hedge against recession in a way that building homes isn't.

5-10% avg annual return for farms isn't a hard & fast rule either.

Here's someone complaining on how poor lil Great Plains wheat farms, notoriously spotty on profit, "only" made 11.8% avg annual returns for 10 years.

That's competitive with housing development! Why are we complaining?

So the problem with farms & food isn't profit.

It's that you gotta work. Every year you have to just keep running that farm or food handling facility.

And to run a farm or food facility at profit, you have to know what you're doing.

Farms & food is a real job! That's the problem!

Meanwhile putting in the work every day & knowing wtf you're doing, those aren't as much of a barrier in real estate ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Anyway, I'm thinking a lot about how foodies spent the last 30 years lecturing poor people on "making wise choices with their food dollars."

They should have been counseling landowners on making wise choices with their property.

And I want to be clear, this problem doesn't have to be permanent.

We still have PLENTY of farmland, knowledgeable people, & capital to grow a lot of the things that we import right now. And yes! We can do it competitively!

The real question "Can we be bothered?"