this post was submitted on 21 Oct 2023
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A Boring Dystopia

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So far, fear has driven investors to sell consumer-exposed stocks. A basket of such companies — including Oreo cookies maker Mondelez International Inc. and Modelo beer producer Constellation Brand Inc. — is down nearly 9% since early August with losses roughly double those of the S&P 500 Index, while makers of things like insulin pumps have wiped out close to a third of their value over the same stretch amid concerns that fewer people will need their products.

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[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 45 points 2 years ago (2 children)

People being more healthy and living longer also threatens the profits of health care providers and funeral homes. The government should do something about that. Maybe ban exercise, or implement a mandatory daily cheese infusion. Would that make the capitalists happy?

[–] AZERTY@feddit.nl 15 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Depends on the kind of cheese tbh.

[–] lettruthout@lemmy.world 6 points 2 years ago

Yeah, I wonder if the makers of KRAFT EASY CHEESE CHEDDAR IN CAN have considered an IV attachment.

[–] squiblet@kbin.social 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Yep, living longer? After useful labor age, while collecting social security, medicare and pensions? I can't imagine republican politicians really wanting that.

[–] Raiderkev@lemmy.world 35 points 2 years ago (2 children)

This has been in financial news for a few weeks. I personally don't think the weight loss drug has anything to do with it. What I think happened is these companies jacked the price up on their "food". People already know it's bad for you, and raising price just led people to make better, more health conscious decisions rather than pay $6 for a bag of chips. I know anecdotally that I have done exactly that, and when I do get chips or crackers nowadays, it's the store brand. Fuck Mondelez, Frito-Lay and coca cola. I'm not paying higher price for stuff I already know I shouldn't be eating.

[–] Something_Complex@lemmy.world 11 points 2 years ago

Yhe they just decided to blame the drug for their fuck up. Lol

[–] RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago

Trader Joe's Ridge Cut potato chips are the best potato chips on planet earth.

[–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 34 points 2 years ago

Man... The media are really pushing this shit hard lately.

[–] squiblet@kbin.social 33 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Everything about this article is definitely absurdly horrible. “Earnings season” is a reasonable concept, I guess, but somehow I don’t feel good at all about such financial abstractions that people take very seriously. The concept that these companies depended on excessive or compulsive consumption to make money and people are cutting down not because they obtained a clue or motivation, but due to an injectable drug, is pretty pathetic for humankind.

[–] subignition@kbin.social 13 points 2 years ago (1 children)

We have this cultural fixation that "mind over matter" and willpower alone can do anything, but the reality is that we are just animals with a slight bit of clever self-awareness on top. I feel like judging humankind as pathetic is misplaced here, when the reality we don't want to admit is that modern processed foods are as unnatural to our reward systems and present hazardous habit-forming as some drugs. There are a lot of people in situations with food that they can't easily get out of on their own and we should maybe consider whether there is such a thing as a food product too addictive to allow for sale to the public

[–] squiblet@kbin.social 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

My concern is that they're replacing a group of unnatural products with a pharmaceutical, without addressing the underlying causes. Most people regain weight after ending use of the drug. This is quite an expensive medication, as well. Also check out the list of side effects.

While it's reasonable, I don't think the public would accept broad restrictions on basic food composition.

[–] subignition@kbin.social 1 points 2 years ago

I'm sorry, I should have been more explicit that I don't really condone weight loss pharmaceuticals either. The situation needs to change; it just sounded a little bit like you were overlooking the underlying cause to blame personal responsibility/willpower of people who might be resorting to meds for their weight/health management. Obviously that's not the case and I was mistaken lol.

In my mind, addressing the underlying causes isn't going to be "broad restrictions on basic food composition", it's going to be broad restrictions on highly processed foods - sanity checks, if you will, mainly by a category of regulatory actions similar to forbidding or limiting HFCS usage by manufacturers, or putting reasonable limits on how many calories a drive-through business is allowed to sell per person per transaction or something. Maybe certain food additives that are particularly addictive or unhealthy

I don't see a reasonable alternative other than "educate everybody out of it" which seems like an equally Sisyphean task and doesn't adequately address the role the food industry plays in engineering these kinds of dependencies for profit.

[–] HorseRabbit@lemmy.sdf.org 14 points 2 years ago
[–] treadful@lemmy.zip 13 points 2 years ago (3 children)

How prolific is a diet pill if it has brought down sales by 9%? Or are these relatively few people really having that much of an impact?

[–] Desistance@lemmy.world 8 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Ozempic type of treatments are extremely effective. Not only does it cause weight loss but it causes drastic reduction in appetite.

[–] I_Miss_Daniel@kbin.social 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] naevaTheRat@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

while you're on it

and you can't stay on it forever

[–] treadful@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 years ago

eh, with most weight gain it happens over a long period of time. If one gains like 5lbs/yr after 20 years that's 100lbs. A short term solution might help reduce weight to a place where they can learn to stabilize their weight.

[–] XanXic@lemmy.world 4 points 2 years ago

There's a shortage of it. They cant produce enough of it right now. So pretty prolific. Also it's an injection.

But there's online services that will let you get it for weight loss for like $200 a month and practically no push back because they are operating in a weird online pharmacy grey market. The Verge just did a big article about it. But that worked so well that company isn't doing it anymore because they caused a shortage and can't supply themselves.

[–] Dogyote@slrpnk.net 4 points 2 years ago

Or are these relatively few people really having that much of an impact?

I'm imagining a world where 99% of grocery shoppers ignore the cookie aisle while the last 1% fill their carts with Oreos every visit, like Whales in pay to win mobile games.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 13 points 2 years ago

Isn't Ozempic really expensive? I doubt most overweight people are taking it and plenty of non-overweight people eat endless junk food.

[–] MajorHavoc@lemmy.world 12 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Stock Investor: My portfolio feels threatened by the possible future underperformance of Oreo.

Normal person with a rational outlook on life: Guys, we did it! Stop trying so hard!

If profits are flat, learn to accept that cookies are a sometimes food

And for the venture capitalists who won't let us keep nice things - you took away Kaybee Toys and Toys R Us. If you take away Oreos, I can't guarantee your safety. /s

[–] PeleSpirit@lemmy.world 9 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] lettruthout@lemmy.world 17 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Earnings season is the period of time during which a large number of publicly traded companies release their quarterly earning reports. In general, each earnings season begins one or two weeks after the last month of each quarter (December, March, June, and September).

https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/08/earnings-season.asp

[–] PeleSpirit@lemmy.world 4 points 2 years ago

Thanks, do you know how important this is for the average person? For example, should you not apply to public traded companies during this time, or maybe you should?

[–] guyrocket@kbin.social 9 points 2 years ago

So these junk food profiteers got caught with their hands in the cookie jar?

Cry me a river, assholes. Take some responsibility for the damage your products do to public health.

[–] ristoril_zip@lemmy.zip 7 points 2 years ago

Jesus do the masters of the universe really want a recession bad. Just constantly telling their media companies to report in a definite economic downturn coming any day now.

I guess the COVID recession just wasn't on the right timetable for them? Or they were too busy trying not to die that they couldn't maximize their recession profiteering?

[–] JoMiran@lemmy.ml 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I discussed this with my wife at least two or three months ago. I'm glad to see Bloomberg continues to feed investors the stalest data possible.

[–] lettruthout@lemmy.world 16 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Oh, I forgot when your wife and I talked about this. Say hi to her for me!

[–] JoMiran@lemmy.ml 6 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Meaning, that this has been on the news for months. Also, it's not a dig on you, it's a dig on Bloomberg. Instructional investors already have puts in place. Late articles like this just fuck the individual investors.

EDIT: *institutional

[–] oDDmON@lemmy.world 4 points 2 years ago
[–] Pregnenolone@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] Marin_Rider@aussie.zone 1 points 2 years ago

and funnily woolies stocks are taking a bit of a dive too