This week on the podcast: Errol Schweizer, one of the sharpest minds in food + grocery. Former Whole Foods V.P., Forbes writer and author of The Checkout Grocery Update on Substack, he unpacks the politics shaping our food system. @grocerynerd.bsky.social

Excellent op-ed on public grocery stores from @civileats.com by @rajpatel.org and @grocerynerd.bsky.social. Props to @lisaelaineh.bsky.social for sharing through email newsletter.

Important read by the inimitable @grocerynerd.bsky.social and @rajpatel.org ! civileats.com/2025/08/20/o...

I really liked this @grocerynerd.bsky.social update on a Co-op grocery store. grocerynerd.substack.com/p/grocery-up...

So. I've been on field manual labor crews where most of my coworkers were convicts. I've also worked with a lot of tech companies on automating farms. And this press conference is incredible. Rollins hasn't the foggiest clue what she's on about.

Please believe me when I tell you: Double the fuck down on your spiritual practice now. You are going to need it. And no, that doesn't have to be a prayer-god thing. The thing that sustains and nourishes you. That makes you more alive to yourself, the world, others. More present. More:

You can’t separate climate justice from worker justice. Agricultural workers are out in 100+ degree heat with NO federal protections. No shade, no water, no breaks. While billionaires stay cool in their boardrooms, working people are DYING from heat. www.cnn.com/2025/06/24/w...

open.substack.com/pub/groceryn... this is for the folks who doubted @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social and his programs. They are viable and popular. We can have good food for all.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed sweeping legislation Sunday to slap warning labels on potentially tens of thousands of food and beverage packages — a move that could have ripple effects across the country.

If Democrats truly want to appeal to young men, they should probably start presenting themselves as the party that definitively *won’t* draft you into an illegal war.

Last year, Kroger's CEO raked in $15.4 million — 457x more than its typical employee. Kroger also announced $7.5 billion in stock buybacks. I don't want to hear that Kroger can't afford to treat its employees fairly. Solidarity to these workers.

Underpaid & fed-up - Hudson News workers are rallying for a fair contract! Workers, community allies, and elected officials came together at SeaTac to show our solidarity. Later this month at the bargaining table it'll be up to Hudson to decide if workers will vote to strike or to ratify a contract.

There’s a word for a system of government run by one person who prizes loyalty to the throne above all else — and it ain’t democracy.

The correct way to connect the authoritarian presence in LA and the Big Beautiful Bill is that the bill gives the government the resources to do this in dozens of cities at once. So if you don't like what's happening in LA, it's coming to your town if the bill passes.

Not too late to sign, Jews. Not too late to amplify, everyone:

Nothin but the facts

I’ve said it before but it is embarrassing that so many intellectuals spent years in small factional battles over the propriety of calling this fascism.

Grocery workers are fighting over many of the same things as the broader labor movement—for living wages, health and safety, against understaffing and tiers. Their fight is also for the common good—understaffing and consolidation hurt community access to groceries and medication:

Big Ag + Human Trafficking: "Recent graduates were told they were coming to the US for cultural exchange. They ended up trapped in a factory farm." Blockbuster piece by @ninaelkadi.com and incredible legal work by @farmstand.bsky.social

Kroger is allegedly overcharging consumers by listing expired sales prices on shelves and charging full price at checkout.  And thanks to decades of consolidation, Kroger stores are now the only grocers in some rural areas.   Minimal competition means maximized price gouging.

"Underage workers have been hired to kill poultry flocks, handle dead carcasses and clean industrial poultry farms... showed workers self-identifying as young as 15." Blockbuster piece by John McCracken

Pope Leo XIV used his first Sunday address to the faithful to call for peace. “Never again war,” he said to a roar from the crowd in St. Peter’s Square.

9/10 grocery store workers report price gouging at their stores while 4/5 workers are unable to pay basic living costs open.substack.com/pub/groceryn...

9/10 grocery store workers report price gouging at their stores while 4/5 workers are unable to pay basic living costs: an important new report on Krogers & Albertsons h/t Errol Schweizer economicrt.org/publication/...

Republican Governor @gregabbottx.bsky.social said Texas “wears the crown as the bitcoin mining capital of the world.” For @therealnews.com I've spoken to working-class residents in Granbury who live right next to a massive bitcoin mine & are paying the horrific price for Texas’s crypto boom...

These publicly traded retailers are just atm machines for the moneyed class. open.substack.com/pub/groceryn...

“We need to put Driscoll’s in the bad company column" -Dolores Huerta Driscoll's refuses to produce organic berries next to schools. “I look at it like murder,” said Ann Aurelia López. “You’re exposing kids to things that will potentially kill them."

Store brands, or private labels, continue to gain market share. The year over year growth of store brands far exceeds that of national brands and it is accelerating. Over 59% of US consumers would buy more private label... open.substack.com/pub/groceryn...

grocerynerd.substack.com/p/grocery-up... @foodchainworkers.bsky.social @ipes-food.org @healfoodalliance.bsky.social

HAPPY MAY DAY ✊🍞🌹 Here’s a whole thing on the labor justice imperatives in Judaism:

🚨NEWS: The Federal Reserve says that as prices increase, corporate profits have hit at an unprecedented share of national income & that the profiteering is “driven by an increase in dividends rewarding shareholders” — while worker compensation declines. www.levernews.com/how-sharehol...

personally would like to see every store show what part of the price increase is due to tariffs bc if these tariffs ever come down, i need to see that price go right back down

More Americans are reporting using "Buy Now, Pay Later" plans to purchase groceries, according to a survey from Lending Tree. 25% of respondents said they used BNPL loans for groceries. That number was 14% in 2024.

a President Bernie Sanders woulda been removed by a military coup supported by both parties and their pundits had he amassed this economic performance after 100 days in office

What do South Africa’s Black Working Class, Donald Trump, and Elon Musk have in common? Hammer and Hope interviews Abahlali baseMjondolo's Zandile Nsibande to find out more on land + politics. hammerandhope.org/article/musk...

If you are new to this channel, here are some of our most important analyses about how the grocery industry functions, the retail math and the sleight of hand that brings food to shelves. open.substack.com/pub/groceryn...

🚨INVESTIGATION: Trump ended a price-gouging probe - now corporations are plotting to use his tariff threats to impose price increases, even if they're not hit by the tariffs. “Now is the time to take advantage," said one "price optimization" consultant. www.levernews.com/how-trump-is...

Former Shen Yun workers say the group profits by exploiting an "army of child laborers" who often work 15-hours days, six days a week, for just $500 a month. The two workers who have come forward began working for Shen Yun at ages 15 and 13.

Pope Francis staying alive long enough to insult JD Vance is an amazing exercise in will. May his memory be a blessing.

Two-thirds of NYers support city-owned grocery stores. Three-fourths support free buses. Nearly 80% support a rent-freeze. I'm running for mayor to deliver these exact policies. Our campaign is surging because unlike Andrew Cuomo, we know what working people need and deserve.

We demand agrarian reform, redistribution of land to those who till it, an end to criminalization & recognition of rights of peasants, as enshrined in #UNDROP 📃https://shorturl.at/bvvH9 #PeasantStruggles @defendingundrop.bsky.social @marylawlorhrds.bsky.social @michaelfakhri.bsky.social

"Visiting the Faroes, I learned a whole new way that America is a humiliating international laggard. Our tax system is about the worst of all possible worlds—expensive, ultra-complicated, inefficient, slow, inaccurate, wildly unfair, and an enormous headache for the citizenry." From @ryanlcooper.com

But Walmart is Walmart, still the center of the grocery universe, the supermassive black hole about which all else rotates, willingly or not. We are all just in the Walmart accretion disk. open.substack.com/pub/groceryn...

Just IPES-Food's animation video, "WHY CHEAP FOOD COMES AT A VERY HIGH PRICE", being shown on the main floor of the @fao.org. While cheap ultra processed food is the norm, a low price tag comes with very heavy costs — for health, people, & planet. 📺 www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGd6... #scalingtca

Pump And Dump open.substack.com/pub/groceryn...

Any traders with inside information that Trump was going to walk back his tariffs — some of them, presumably, Trump family members and cronies — just made a fortune. It all feels like chaos until you look more closely at who is winning.