Disaster resilience/panic buying

[Ausmumof3]

This is obviously a common theme over the last year or so.  One thing I’m wondering is why doesn’t rationing kick in earlier.  If somethings running into short supply why not have a threshold where rationing kicks in.  Like if a shop is down to the last x packs of toilet paper one pack per family kicks in.  Likewise for more critical stuff like fuel and bread etc.  

[prairiewindmomma]

Some stores here, like HEB (a Texas grocery store) are very good at that. In fact, they make a lot of their own product and will focus on key commodities to make sure they keep flowing.https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/how-heb-became-emergency-preparedness-model/amp/

It takes a lot of supply chain awareness and planning to apply rationing in a timely way. Many deliveries are “just in time” and you lose a lot of resilience with that. It’s cheaper to not store a lot of goods in warehouses, but it makes a availability difficult to manage.

[Carrie12345]

Grocery stores tend to run about 3 days of inventory. That’s a very narrow window for spotting a sudden AND lasting run on a few products. Flukes happen, so an actual issue could take a minute to recognize.  Different chains also have different lead times for ordering the next delivery from even their own warehouses, where applicable, and I don’t even know what that looks like between corporate and individual manufacturers. (I merely did ordering for the cooler section of one Rite Aid in the 90s.)  The real extent of the situation doesn’t necessarily reveal itself immediately.

What HEB did is actually a perfect example of what the US’s system is supposed to aim for at all levels (personal, NGO/private companies, local, county, state, fed) according to documents written and developed by the US gov’t!

On the current fuel situation, I don’t know what the right answer is. If it turns out to be a short term event as they say they predict, would a few days of rationing be worth the trouble? My guess is no.  If it turns out to be a longer term event, would rationing for these past few days and into the next week make a big difference? Perhaps it would for essential services, but otherwise I have no idea.
Even within that, unless there’s already an emergency plan in place (and it doesn’t sound like it) it would take time to develop the “rules” to apply. What do average citizens get? Businesses? Emergency personnel? Airports? How often? How long does that stretch it? What’s the social and economic impact and how does that get managed?

This is all why having emergency plans, whether a sahm, a grocery store chain, or a pipeline company, is important. (Says someone who discovered dh hadn’t been rotating our small supply of emergency gas. Sigh.)

[Carol in Cal.]

It’s hard to hoard flammable liquids or gases in sufficient quantities to be meaningful if you need them for transportation or heat.  I don’t know what the solution is, but those particular items almost have to be ‘just in time’ in which case rationing is quite a significant hardship in and of itself.  

During the 70s here in CA we had gasoline rationing.  You could only buy gas on even numbered or odd numbered dates, depending on what your license plate last digit was, and only when your gasoline tank was half full or less.  What actually happened was that people were always worried about running out, perpetually, and also I think concerned that the rationing might get worse, so everyone that *could* waited in long lines at the gas stations every chance they could get, and used up a lot of gas idling in line.  I’m not sure that this actually saved any gas, and it was very tough on folks who were extremely pressed for time.  

The law of unintended consequences is pretty relentless.

 

[Carrie12345]

18 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

It’s hard to hoard flammable liquids or gases in sufficient quantities to be meaningful if you need them for transportation or heat.  I don’t know what the solution is, but those particular items almost have to be ‘just in time’ in which case rationing is quite a significant hardship in and of itself.  

During the 70s here in CA we had gasoline rationing.  You could only buy gas on even numbered or odd numbered dates, depending on what your license plate last digit was, and only when your gasoline tank was half full or less.  What actually happened was that people were always worried about running out, perpetually, and also I think concerned that the rationing might get worse, so everyone that *could* waited in long lines at the gas stations every chance they could get, and used up a lot of gas idling in line.  I’m not sure that this actually saved any gas, and it was very tough on folks who were extremely pressed for time.  

The law of unintended consequences is pretty relentless.

 

Let’s also keep in mind that the 70s didn’t have the telecommuting options of today.  Obviously that still doesn’t apply to everyone today, but it can reduce the impact.  Then and now, it’s kind of impossible not to worry if transportation is the difference between getting paid and not.

[Ausmumof3]

Thanks lots of interesting thoughts.  I agree the just in time model seems to make countries quite vulnerable.  It does avoid wastage and spoilage of course.  I’m not thinking extreme rationing I don’t think - just maybe stopping people from filling up multiple jerry cans of fuel or like whole trolleys with toilet paper.  

[TravelingChris]

2 hours ago, Carol in Cal. said:

It’s hard to hoard flammable liquids or gases in sufficient quantities to be meaningful if you need them for transportation or heat.  I don’t know what the solution is, but those particular items almost have to be ‘just in time’ in which case rationing is quite a significant hardship in and of itself.  

During the 70s here in CA we had gasoline rationing.  You could only buy gas on even numbered or odd numbered dates, depending on what your license plate last digit was, and only when your gasoline tank was half full or less.  What actually happened was that people were always worried about running out, perpetually, and also I think concerned that the rationing might get worse, so everyone that *could* waited in long lines at the gas stations every chance they could get, and used up a lot of gas idling in line.  I’m not sure that this actually saved any gas, and it was very tough on folks who were extremely pressed for time.  

The law of unintended consequences is pretty relentless.

 

It wasn't just in CA.  It was in most of the US.

[TravelingChris]

The cans of fuel we can't do much about since most gas stations don't have attendants so there is no one to enforce anything.

As to shortages in regular stores, I know that Publix puts up signs that limit purchases to 2 when there is a shortage.

[Faith-manor]

I think this nation made a big mistake when it moved to long distance hauling of most stock instead of just investing even more in freight train lines. One big issue is that when truck drivers lost their jobs or were furloughed during the pandemic when buying/shopping was way down, many drivers retired and others re-trained for different jobs. Essential workers like hazardous load drivers also opted to use our governor's free tuition at community colleges and state universities to go back to school and get into completely different lines of work. I agreed with her tuition offer and have no problem with that. People need more choices, not less, and some folks who have been driving for years because they felt stuck in the industry were able to make a move. I applaud that. But the industry has not been able to replace those drivers. Younger folks do not want the job, and I don't blame them. Long distance trucking is a thankless, exhausting job often at low pay for the hours spent away from the family, and frankly, the trucking industry management are jerks (and that term is really way too kind, they are worse than that very often). So all of these trucks being parked and no one to drive them is causing distribution headaches, and when stores only run on two or three days of inventory, it causes shortages.

The pandemic, natural disaster response, and cyber security issues of the past year highlight just how fragile our infrastructure has become. I also think we will see more of it, and not less for a while. It is going to take a serious chunk of time to update just cyber security systems so this is going to happen more, not less, until we finally decide that the "free market" can't be trusted to be quite so free, and force enough regulatory practice to get the investment done, and fine the absolute crap out of them for such colossal screw ups.  My dh, a database architect, says this ransomeware take down is nothing more than greedy neglect on the part of the company...too damn greedy to spend the money to upgrade systems, and we saw that in Texas with the power grid, and in many other instances.

I have no idea how to motivate the political structure to do something. Here in Michigan, Governor Whitmer and AG Nessel are doing battle with Enbridge over the ecological destruction caused by their pipeline through the Mackinaw Straits which had not received anything anywhere near industry standard maintenance in the last 50 years! They have proven to be an evil company. But you would not believe the uphill climb this is to shutdown that line! Meanwhile, 22% of the entire world's freshwater is being contaminated, and the environmental fallout is going to take many years to recover from. If it is this hard to force one company to do what is right,  I cannot imagine this fight on a national scale over a variety of issues and corporations. But the infrastructure "war" needs to begin nonetheless.

[Carol in Cal.]

4 hours ago, TravelingChris said:

It wasn't just in CA.  It was in most of the US.

Yes, and no.  I lived in Vermont during one of the two shortages, and we didn’t have gas lines, whereas my mom was sitting in them writing me more letters than during the remainder of my life. We were encouraged to conserve, and of course the lower speed limit was imposed nationwide, but CA was a state that had significantly worse gas shortages than others.

Scuttlebutt at the time was that Jimmy Carter was trying to lower the standing of the CA dem. Governor at the time, who was expected to run for the Dem. nomination against him in the next presidential election.

[Pawz4me]

11 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

Yes, and no.  I lived in Vermont during one of the two shortages, and we didn’t have gas lines, whereas my mom was sitting in them writing me more letters than during the remainder of my life. We were encouraged to conserve, and of course the lower speed limit was imposed nationwide, but CA was a state that had significantly worse gas shortages than others.

Scuttlebutt at the time was that Jimmy Carter was trying to lower the standing of the CA dem. Governor at the time, who was expected to run for the Dem. nomination against him in the next presidential election.

I was in NC. There was lots of rationing and very long lines here. I remember the odd/even days and very long lines in front of our house waiting to get into the gas station that was down the road.

[prairiewindmomma]

If they wanted to ration gasoline, they could just set the credit card reader to sell no more than $25 or $50/gas and have an attendant out there moving customers along. People get pretty heated about not being able to buy gasoline, though, especially those who must be physically present at work or they are fired.

[Pawz4me]

1 minute ago, prairiewindmomma said:

If they wanted to ration gasoline, they could just set the credit card reader to sell no more than $25 or $50/gas and have an attendant out there moving customers along. People get pretty heated about not being able to buy gasoline, though, especially those who must be physically present at work or they are fired.

A lot of stations always have their pumps automatically cut off at $100. But (at least in normal times) there's nothing that stops you from swiping your card again and pumping more. I suspect, given how heated lots of people are about this, most stations wouldn't want to task an employee with enforcing rationing. But I do wish stations in the affected areas (including mine) would institute some sort of rationing, even though it wouldn't work perfectly.

[Carol in Cal.]

8 minutes ago, Pawz4me said:

I was in NC. There was lots of rationing and very long lines here. I remember the odd/even days and very long lines in front of our house waiting to get into the gas station that was down the road.

And I think there were two distinct shortages in CA and one elsewhere.  I’m talking about the one that was worse in CA.  

In CA there were also stations that closed when they ran out of gas, and that was not uncommon.  Shipments here were diverted.  There were people who waited in line for a couple of hours and then were turned away.  

Anyway, the point is, I don’t know that that saved or better dispersed any petroleum.  And it was very hard on some.  My mom was a SAHM, and her kids were all in school.  She could do the waiting in line during school hours, and have a reasonable expectation of getting gas eventually since it was early in the day.  But not every household had someone who could make themselves available like that.  It was a true hardship and I’m not convinced that it accomplished much.

If lots of households had gas tanks at home or were filling big tanks on campers and then siphoning the gas into their cars, maybe rationing would have been helpful.  But in a ‘just in time’ delivery system, which is what this amounted to, there wasn’t much to be gained by rationing.

[Bootsie]

If a grocery store saw that it was running low on TP, or any other itme, it does not know for sure if it is ithe only store experiencing this or if it is a broader problem.   If people are in the store and all of a sudden the manager runs and puts up a sign of "only one package of TP per family" that in and of itself is likely to start panic buying.  I wasn't needing TP, but there must be a problem so I better grab some, and I'll stop at another store along the way home and grab more, and I give my kids $$$ to get in line themselves to buy a package, and I will call my neighbor and tell her to run get some...  This is the old-fashioned back run scenario.  

[bluemongoose]

I remember the gas lines in California. We got in a car accident in one. I was little, but that made it stick in my memory. 

[Pawz4me]

17 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

And I think there were two distinct shortages in CA and one elsewhere.  I’m talking about the one that was worse in CA.  

In CA there were also stations that closed when they ran out of gas, and that was not uncommon.  Shipments here were diverted.  There were people who waited in line for a couple of hours and then were turned away.

The same thing occurred here -- there were two rounds of it, stations out of gas, etc. I can't speak about CA, though. Probably the only reason I really remember what happened is because there was a continual long line of cars right on our street, and of course it had a huge impact on our neighbors who owned the gas station. I remember them being extremely stressed. And the school bus was always late (and thus we were late getting to school) because it got stuck in the line, etc. Even as a self centered and still somewhat clueless young kid that kind of stuff gets your attention. But I don't recall caring or being curious about whether or not it was happening other places in the country.

[Melissa Louise]

Petrol was rationed here back in the...70's? 80's? I'm very hazy on why - strikes? 

But you could only buy on alternate days, and it went by number plate - ending in an even number one day, odd number the next. 

[chiguirre]

We had gas rationing and long lines in PA too.

It was due to the Arab Oil Embargo in 1973 and the Iranian Revolution in 1979.

[JFSinIL]

I'm still ticked off that the local supermarket let two men come in and buy over 90 bottles of hand sanitizer at the start of COVID, the store's entire stock.  An employee told me the men claimed to be buying it to have on their employee's desks.  Uh huh. 

[JFSinIL]

1 hour ago, Melissa Louise said:

Petrol was rationed here back in the...70's? 80's? I'm very hazy on why - strikes? 

But you could only buy on alternate days, and it went by number plate - ending in an even number one day, odd number the next. 

I remember that. I worked at a mom and pop donut shop that was in a busy corner strip mall with a gas station.  Station did not open until 6am...we got to work between 4 and 5am.  Station owner was fine with us parking at the pumps as long as we ran out promptly at 6am to gas our cars and move them. He also got free coffee and donuts whenever he wanted them!  There would be a line of cars behind ours, and usually by then a line of our early morning regulars in the donut shop.  One set of folks were cranky, the other amused.  You can imagine which was which.

[Longtime Lurker]

11 hours ago, Faith-manor said:

I think this nation made a big mistake when it moved to long distance hauling of most stock instead of just investing even more in freight train lines. One big issue is that when truck drivers lost their jobs or were furloughed during the pandemic when buying/shopping was way down, many drivers retired and others re-trained for different jobs. Essential workers like hazardous load drivers also opted to use our governor's free tuition at community colleges and state universities to go back to school and get into completely different lines of work. I agreed with her tuition offer and have no problem with that. People need more choices, not less, and some folks who have been driving for years because they felt stuck in the industry were able to make a move. I applaud that. But the industry has not been able to replace those drivers. Younger folks do not want the job, and I don't blame them. Long distance trucking is a thankless, exhausting job often at low pay for the hours spent away from the family, and frankly, the trucking industry management are jerks (and that term is really way too kind, they are worse than that very often). So all of these trucks being parked and no one to drive them is causing distribution headaches, and when stores only run on two or three days of inventory, it causes shortages.

The pandemic, natural disaster response, and cyber security issues of the past year highlight just how fragile our infrastructure has become. I also think we will see more of it, and not less for a while. It is going to take a serious chunk of time to update just cyber security systems so this is going to happen more, not less, until we finally decide that the "free market" can't be trusted to be quite so free, and force enough regulatory practice to get the investment done, and fine the absolute crap out of them for such colossal screw ups.  My dh, a database architect, says this ransomeware take down is nothing more than greedy neglect on the part of the company...too damn greedy to spend the money to upgrade systems, and we saw that in Texas with the power grid, and in many other instances.

I have no idea how to motivate the political structure to do something. Here in Michigan, Governor Whitmer and AG Nessel are doing battle with Enbridge over the ecological destruction caused by their pipeline through the Mackinaw Straits which had not received anything anywhere near industry standard maintenance in the last 50 years! They have proven to be an evil company. But you would not believe the uphill climb this is to shutdown that line! Meanwhile, 22% of the entire world's freshwater is being contaminated, and the environmental fallout is going to take many years to recover from. If it is this hard to force one company to do what is right,  I cannot imagine this fight on a national scale over a variety of issues and corporations. But the infrastructure "war" needs to begin nonetheless.

My Dad always said we may regret converting so many train tracks into bike trails...