diff --git a/inc/python b/inc/python
index f98d28d..8941fd0 100644
--- a/inc/python
+++ b/inc/python
@@ -170,7 +170,13 @@
         local sudo_pip="env"
     else
         local cmd_pip="python$PYTHON3_VERSION -m pip"
-        local sudo_pip="sudo -H LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8"
+        # See
+        #  https://github.com/pypa/setuptools/issues/2232
+        #  http://lists.openstack.org/pipermail/openstack-discuss/2020-August/016905.html
+        # this makes setuptools >=50 use the platform distutils.
+        # We only want to do this on global pip installs, not if
+        # installing in a virtualenv
+        local sudo_pip="sudo -H LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8 SETUPTOOLS_USE_DISTUTILS=stdlib "
         echo "Using python $PYTHON3_VERSION to install $package_dir"
     fi