Like most “but why US” questions, the answer starts with ‘M’ and rhymes with ‘oney’.
The dairy lobby is powerful in the US, for reasons I’ve never bothered to look into the few times one of their tantrums end up on the news.
It’s a matter of the Nexus of regulatory capture, unrestricted money in politics, and historic Inertia is my surface understanding of why ‘Dairy’ is such a bristly thing here.
Dairy’s really got their power in the 1940’s-1950’s when most farmers had around 10 head of dairy cows they milked. If was a major source of income to most rural American farmers. These farmers established dairy associations that were and still are highly politically active.
Most of them established a association fees based upon the amount of milk they produced. So they had a lot of money to spend on lobbying and voting power in rural communities. They then used that power to shape national policy and do national marketing campaigns.
With the consolidation of the industry since the 1980’s their voting power has declined but the money for lobbying keeps flowing. Since the u.s. government is controlled by legal bribery at this point…
That does not really explain the lack of use on the technology (which you do have, to make milk products lactose free) and the lack of products/marketing on lactose free milk products.
Isnt USA all about making new products for new consumers? If we can do it here, in a much smaller markets and with less resources, why cant it be done in the USA? You do have lots of lactose intolerant people there, through immigration alone - why on earth dont you, salesmen of the planet, want to sell that to them?
Thats why I do kinda of suppose that maybe its an cultural/social issue?
Isnt USA all about making new products for new consumers?
If the corps that make the original product are making the alternative, yes. If they are not, then no. Just see all the fighting over meat alternatives and even lab grown meat. The meat industry is fighting pretty hard to make sure they can’t market them as meat or meat alternatives.