{"id":61601,"date":"2022-01-22T13:48:53","date_gmt":"2022-01-22T18:48:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=61601"},"modified":"2022-01-22T13:48:53","modified_gmt":"2022-01-22T18:48:53","slug":"rickards-bad-news-im-afraid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=61601","title":{"rendered":"Rickards: Bad News, I\u2019m Afraid"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"small-12 medium-10 medium-centered columns featured-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/dweaay7e22a7h.cloudfront.net\/wp-content_3\/uploads\/2020\/12\/Bad-News-650x360.jpg\" alt=\"Rickards: Bad News, I\u2019m Afraid\" \/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"row content-body\">\n<div class=\"small-12 medium-10 medium-centered columns\">\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div id=\"single-article-body\" class=\"small-12 medium-10 columns single-article\">\n<h3><a href=\"https:\/\/dailyreckoning.com\/rickards-bad-news-im-afraid\/\">Rickards: Bad News, I\u2019m Afraid<\/a><\/h3>\n<p>The breakdown of global supply chains is well-known by now. Whether it\u2019s finding groceries in your supermarket, buying a new car or buying appliances like dishwashers and refrigerators, goods are scarce. Also, deliveries take forever and choices are limited.<\/p>\n<p>Many people wonder why the problem isn\u2019t going away. Here\u2019s the answer:<\/p>\n<p>The supply chain is a complex dynamic system. When any complex system collapses, you can look for specific causes but that\u2019s usually a waste of time. Systems collapse internally because they are too large and too interconnected and require too many energy inputs to keep going.<\/p>\n<p>Any specific cause is more likely to be a symptom than a true cause. It\u2019s frustrating, but that\u2019s the answer.<\/p>\n<p>Most Americans\u2019 first encounter with the supply chain meltdown was in the spring of 2020 during the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic. Shoppers noticed that items like hand sanitizer and paper goods at Costco and other big-box stores were cleaned out.<\/p>\n<p>It seemed that Americans who were locked down and quarantined at the time were hoarding these products because they had no idea when they would be allowed to venture out again.<\/p>\n<p>The shortages were real, but were limited to specific products. The other aisles at Costco were stocked and so were all the other stores around (at least those that were allowed to remain open).<\/p>\n<p class=\"centered subhead\"><b>Now It\u2019s Everything<\/b><\/p>\n<p>But it\u2019s not just Costco this time. It\u2019s every supermarket, convenience store and other retail outlet from coast to coast. And it\u2019s not just cleaning products and paper goods. Your local supermarket might have bare shelves for eggs, peanut butter, milk and other staples.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not a case of being stocked out of all goods all the time. Your store is like a box of Cracker Jack \u2013 you never know what\u2019s inside.<\/p>\n<p>\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rickards: Bad News, I\u2019m Afraid The breakdown of global supply chains is well-known by now. Whether it\u2019s finding groceries in your supermarket, buying a new car or buying appliances like dishwashers and refrigerators, goods are scarce. Also, deliveries take forever and choices are limited. Many people wonder why the problem isn\u2019t going away. Here\u2019s the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13599,607,31091,3237,21387],"class_list":["post-61601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-james-rickards","tag-pandemic","tag-supply-chain-disruptions","tag-supply-chains","tag-the-daily-reckoning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=61601"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":61602,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61601\/revisions\/61602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=61601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=61601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=61601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}