Also... the U.S. already can direct people not to farm and I'm 100% confident in emergencies or if it feels threatened it can take the foreign owned farmland back. I'm not super concerned about this one.
[1] https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-statistic...
I've wondered about this for a while. On one hand, owning investments on foreign soil seems super risky when shit hits the fan, because you depend upon friendly relations with the legal system of the foreign country to enforce your property rights. If it really comes down to "Americans are going hungry and homeless because Chinese are speculating on real estate", don't you think they're going to kick the Chinese out regardless of what the deed says?
OTOH, the scale of interconnectedness across the globe seems to create a very large market for private non-national security companies. It's not just Chinese in America - as the article noted, it's Americans in a wide variety of other countries, as well as corporations owning factories and having whole supply chains across the globe. If shit hits the fan there will be a lot of money seeking mercenaries, private armies, and independent defense contractors to enforce their property rights globally.
It's also a marker for said peace. If there's a lot of trade already, many others will feel comfortable participating because the market has indicated that investing in the relationship is not terribly risky.
If the nation is run by its people then what you describe would indeed happen. If it is run by a small cadre of wealthy then they would invite investment world wide to maximally drive up land values regardless of homeless numbers. Indeed there would be extreme reluctance as any seizure or even hint of it would permanently reduce land values.
Perhaps we'll see which is the case.
Plus it’s not the same as what China is doing in east Africa as it pertains farmland since some of that is tied into deals more or less obligating the countries to comply.
The high agricultural water consumption is basically consumers saying "I value my beef more than my lawn", which is pretty accurate. We hear about residential water conservation (which, as you mention, is a literal drop in the bucket) because nobody's seriously suggesting banning meat, but given the choice between water shortages (as long as it doesn't get to the point where drinking water is endangered) or going without favorite foods, most people would take the water shortages. Chances are, even a significant portion of vegans would rather go with the water shortage if everyone was a vegan and it was no longer an effective way to signal cultural values.
American interests aren't created by individual preferences, but advertising from entrenched corporations that shift real interests, like having food, into more profitable interests, like buying almonds.
"Americans have special rights in America, but your country has to grant Americans a fair playing field versus your own citizens" is colonialism, and one step down from banana republics (where Americans had superior property rights to non-Americans in Honduras)
I thought the great achievement of globalization was furthering Raegan's/Thacher's neoliberal agenda, turning industrial jobs into a race for the bottom where the global lowest wage bidder wins, and undoing a century of labor protections and working/middle class safety nets -- all the while destroying the planet with increased BS trade.
>"Americans have special rights in America, but your country has to grant Americans a fair playing field versus your own citizens"
Who said other countries have to do that? Other countries should prioritize their own citizen's well being too.
Who will trust US government then? Who will use US dollar and invest in US treasury bill and securities?
That is conjecture. Land grabs happen all over the world in a varied number of scenarios without destabilizing economies. Securities each have their own markets, but let's focus on the mortgage bonds.
How the US govt deals with the owenership of real estate is not directly tied to mortgage bonds on those properties, as long as the interest continues to be paid out or off. Eminent domain is a power and I'm not sure how it's use affects these bonds directly without provisions about dissolving them. In such a bold move, it's presumptuous to assume the federal govt wouldn't know the consequences beforehand (eg bank bailouts).
US is different, here private property rights are part of the constitution and can't be taken away for social good like in some European countries.
Constitution is like a set of beliefs, if beliefs are changed, suddenly country loses its identity as beliefs are inherent part of it and then people will have hard time trusting new country.
That's... not at all true.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eminent_domain_in_the_United_S...
Hell, it doesn't even need to be for social good.
At the end of the day the US dollar's strength is tied to the us political and military and economic power, not their trust worthiness.
I trust that the us will us it's army to ensure the value of the dollar stays strong globally.