The World Sugar Committee has criticised ‘parasitic’ traders for the surging price of sugar, which is now at its highest level for thirty years. This is, of course, unfair. A mounting body of evidence suggests that parasites can be beneficial to their hosts. But, as John Cassidy recently put it,
“There was a presumption that financial innovation is socially valuable,” Woolley said to me. “The first thing I discovered was that it wasn’t backed by any empirical evidence. There’s almost none.”
Thanks Raj,
It is often the alternate uses of these commodities which set their prices soaring. In sugar’s case, I don’t think a man as learned as you would need to be told. But for your readers, I will speculate that this sugar is being bought up for fuel.
The US markets continue to rise backed by metals, oil, and commodities trading. This does not only NOT create jobs, but costs them because many independent truckers will have to sit out this oil crisis once again.
It will literally take the world being shaken by the hand of God for the evil owners of the markets to loose their grips on our resources.
This is, of course, unfair. A mounting body of evidence suggests that parasites can be beneficial to their hosts.
Wicked dry humor, that… unless I’m misreading it.
Maybe the “evil owners” of the commodity markets don’t need the hand of god to shake them up; maybe we just simply need to stop purchasing their products. Too much of our diet is tied to Pandora’s Seed – the commodity products from corn, wheat and sugar (tropical grasses) 95% of all plant life are C3 carbon processors with only 5% C4 and it is from this narrow band that we take 75% of our calories. We can change the world when we change what we eat. Simple enough. Don’t wait for divine intervention.
Let them eat cake?
Our bodies are made to burn these fuels(sugars) just as are machines. I will not pretend to think I know what the Hand of God would do. But it is not us eating these food products that are causing the price surge.
In Central KY, one farmer told me that an outfit out of china had purchased 98% of her corn crop, to be USED AS FUEL.
98% of her crop would feed an entire village in Africa for a decade, and one can only assume that she is not alone irt who her largest purchaser was.