I was just in our local Publix supermarket and stood at the condiments shelf and just wondered at the variety and range of seasonings that we had available to us. We tend to forget how expansive and changing our grocery and dining selections have become when compared to past decades.
It must have been about 10 years back when my late father, a man of cast iron stomach in terms of hot/spicy foods, asked me to get him a bottle of Sriracha sauce. So I checked Amazon and got him a bottle on the way. The VERY NEXT DAY, we were shopping in his Publix and, to my disbelieving eyes, there was that sauce on the shelf and CHEAPER than Amazon!
When people talk about socialism, you don’t find this marketing & enterprise in that system. I have visited such countries, incentive is killed!
I worked in communist china in the mid 70s and worked at three job sites from the far north to far south. Choice was non-existent. For example, you had your choice of any table lamp you wanted as long as you chose Heavenly Bamboo Table Lamp from the People’s Table Lamp Factory #5. It was true everywhere in the country.
I’m sure things are a lot better now.
Of course, when I was a kid in the 50s, you had your choice of Crest or Colgate toothpaste. Now there are 500 variations by Crest and 500 variations by Colgate. Today it’s impossible to walk to the toothpaste aisle and just buy plain old toothpaste.