Free Republic

A Texas fast-food chain is shelling out $50,000 salaries for teenagers and those in their early 20s to manage its restaurants as executives struggle to find qualified workers amid a nationwide labor shortage. Garrett Reed, CEO of Layne’s Chicken Fingers, said a downturn in the labor market stymied his company's growth and forced him to dish out large salaries for workers who would make about $12 hourly in entry-level roles after promoting them to managerial positions. “The biggest challenge for small companies to grow right now is your labor force,” he said. “We’d be growing at twice the rate if...

Over the weekend it was reported that Georgia would soon be purging over 100k names from the voter rolls after last year’s election: Georgia will pull about 100,000 “obsolete and outdated voter files” after recent voting rights law controversies, according to its secretary of state. “Making sure Georgia’s voter rolls are up to date is key to ensuring the integrity of our elections,” Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said in a statement. ... Trump just released this statement on the purge, saying it was proof that he won the state of Georgia: “Georgia now plans to remove over 100,000 ‘obsolete...

Ratchadawan Puengprasopporn said her family was asleep when she heard noises coming from the kitchen. When she and her husband went to investigate, they saw the elephant poking its head into her kitchen, rummaging through the shelves and eating a plastic bag containing food. This isn’t the first intrusion she’s had from Boonmee, a wild male elephant in his forties known among residents and park officials as a frequent visitor to the village. Local authorities and national parks officials visited Ratchadawan and her family the next day and advised her to remove food, especially anything salty. Pattarapol Maneeon, a veterinarian...

Before the plunge in commodities late in the week, top executives from Cargill, Cofco, Viterra, and Scoular said this week at the FT Commodities Global Summit that a “mini-supercycle” in agricultural commodities could be on the horizon, boosted by China demand and increasing use for biofuels. These execs forecasted corn, soybeans, and wheat markets will remain robust over the next two to four years. “We certainly see a mini supercycle,” said David Mattiske, chief executive of Viterra, majority-owned by Glencore, told the FT Commodities Global Summit. “We’re in a demand-driven environment with the themes of a growing population, growing wealth,...

The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. If you have specific question about a plant/problem you are having, please remember to state the Growing Zone where you are located. This thread is a non-political respite. No matter what, you won’t be flamed, and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked. It is impossible to hijack...

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has spent nearly US$6 billion over the past 17 years trying to improve agriculture, mainly in Africa. This is a lot of money for an underfunded sector, and, as such, carries great weight. To better understand how the Gates Foundation is shaping the global agriculture agenda, GRAIN analysed all the food and agriculture grants the foundation has made up until 2020. We found that, while the Foundation’s grants focus on African farmers, the vast majority of its funding goes to groups in North America and Europe. The grants are also heavily skewed to technologies...

Video footage has caught the moment an aggressive altercation broke out between a female customer and McDonald's employees over mixing up a slushie. The woman became enraged and assaulted staff when she was told that she could not mix flavors together in her slushie drink.

Ohio is reportedly down to one last Arthur Treacher’s Fish & Chips restaurant with the Garfield Heights location closing its doors last Saturday. Owner Ben Vittoria said the decision to shutter the seafood house was not an easy one, but that, like many other restaurants in the area, he recently had trouble finding enough employees. The location has been open since 1978, with Vittoria taking over the franchise in 2001. And he still owns the last Ohio location in Cuyahoga Falls, telling FOX 8 he plans to dedicate all of his resources to keeping that one running. Vittoria said Arthur...

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un warned about possible food shortages and urged the country to brace for extended COVID-19 restrictions as he opened a major political conference to discuss national efforts to salvage a broken economy. The North’s official Korean Central News Agency also said Wednesday that Kim called for discussions on how the North should deal with the “current international situation,” though it did not mention any specific comments from Kim about the United States or South Korea. North Korea has so far ignored the allies’ calls to resume nuclear negotiations that have stalled for two years following...

US Producer Prices soared 6.6% YoY in May – the fastest pace on record. This is the 13th straight month of MoM PPI increases…Over 40 percent of the May increase in the index for final demand services is attributable to margins for automobile retailing (partial), which jumped 27.3 percent. The indexes for truck transportation of freight; apparel, footwear, and accessories retailing; portfolio management; chemicals and allied products wholesaling; and hardware, building materials, and supplies retailing also rose. Conversely, margins for food retailing fell 3.6 percent. The indexes for traveler accommodation services and for airline passenger services also decreased. Within the...

Some pastries are so scrumptious that nothing will deter fans from tearing into one—not even giving it an off-putting name. The French-Canadian pet de soeur (“sister’s fart”) is no exception. Québécois often bake the flaky spirals of dough during holidays. The pastry, glazed in butter, brown sugar, and occasionally cinnamon, pays crass homage to the nuns who first made it, and it’s significantly tastier than the title implies. Regarding its name, explanations abound. Some say it stems from the sound the dough makes as it’s being fried in oil. Others tell tales of one nun’s fart causing such hysterical laughter...

In recent months a crisis situation in the USA food supply has been growing and is about to assume alarming dimensions that could become catastrophic. Atop the existing corona pandemic lockdowns and unemployment, a looming agriculture crisis as well could tip inflation measures to cause a financial crisis as interest rates rise. The ingredients are many, but central is a severe drought in key growing states of the Dakotas and Southwest, including agriculture-intensive California. So far Washington has done disturbingly little to address the crisis and California Water Board officials have been making the crisis far worse by draining the...

Inflation is making headlines all over the country, but the mainstream media is not being honest about the true severity of the crisis. We are being told that the official rate of inflation is still in single digits, but what we aren’t being told is that the way inflation is calculated has changed dramatically over the years. In fact, according to Forbes “the government has changed the way it calculates inflation more than 20 times” over the past 30 years. The rate of inflation directly affects so many other things in our system, and the government would like to keep...

The next time you’re shopping for groceries or taking in a meal at the local cafe, keep an eye out for newly raised prices. Companies from Chipotle to Piggly Wiggly are raising prices in an effort to make up for elevated costs in labor, goods and transportation, according to The Wall Street Journal. It’s just the latest inconvenience brought about by the real Biden Effect: Rampant inflation and ever-increasing costs. Consumer prices flew upward by five percent in May, marking the highest rate of inflation since the Great Recession. Now, the increasing costs of everyday necessities like food threaten to...

H-E-B's plan to build three new stores in Collin County is being celebrated in some circles while being criticized in others. ... “Metaphorically it’s adding salt to the wound,” said Dallas City Council member Casey Thomas. Those working for years to lure brand-name grocers to Dallas, particularly south of I-30, say these kinds of announcements are just another heartbreak.

President Joe Biden’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced this week it is poised to reverse former President Donald Trump’s Navigable Waters Protection Act that helped farmers and ranchers avoid penalties based on arbitrary definitions of navigable waters that could apply to rainwater puddles, seasonal ponds, and other natural water formations. DTN covered the reaction to the EPA’s move: The Biden EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said in a news release Wednesday the Trump rule has led to a degradation in protection of waters. The agencies asked a federal court to remand the Trump rule, to allow for...

VIDEOFor some reason I've had my doubts as to how well air fryers cook food despite hearing from people who are very enthusiastic about them. However, I remained curious about them and when I heard there was a sale on this air fryer, I decided to take the plunge. In this video we see the results of my first time using an air fryer.

The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. If you have specific question about a plant/problem you are having, please remember to state the Growing Zone where you are located. This thread is a non-political respite. No matter what, you won’t be flamed, and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked. It is impossible to hijack...

Food prices are absolutely outrageous now, but they appear only to be moving higher as the year progresses. According to a new Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) report, global food import costs are estimated to jump in 2021 to a record due to increasing commodity and shipping costs. FAO's "Food Outlook" report, published Thursday, estimates the global food import bill, including shipping-related costs this year, will be around $1.72 trillion, a 12% rise from its previous high of $1.53 trillion in 2020. For readers who are not familiar with the Food Outlook report, it's a bi-annual...

In the world of crops, angst over the weather has reached a fevered pitch. Global inventories are shrinking and demand is on a tear as drought plagues farms in key producers from the U.S. and Brazil to Russia. As a result, every rain shower and dry spell is coming under extreme scrutiny. Grain prices have touched near-decade highs, and whether they rally to further heights or retreat depends in large part on the condition and quantity of plants over the next few months. In the U.S., traders and investors usually focus their attention on giant corn and soybean growers like...