Farm Subsidies & Pork

[davefoc]

Yes, you've put his straw man into a nutshell, and it doesn't make it any less nutty.

Who are these "socialists" anyway?

I don't understand your point, so I am not sure what you are disagreeing with. I think the people who argue that we need tobacco subsidies because tobacco farmers are struggling is exactly the kind of thing that FarmallMTA had in mind. Many people call this kind of market interference socialism and I think it is reasonable to call it a type of socialism.

The subsidies provided to the buyers of SUV's and trucks in the US might be seen as another example. I think part of the idea here was to bail out the struggling US car manufacturer's by subsidizing the segment of the market where they were making a profit.

But perhaps your point is that these aren't examples of socialism. Perhaps with a more narrow definition of socialism, they aren't. OK, I will accede to you semantic point here. Or perhaps your point is that anybody that supports these programs is cynical and not a true believer in socialism so they aren't socialists. I doubt that all people that support these programs are corrupt and cynical. Even in this thread there have been many attempts to justify the corrupt counter productive agricultural subsidy programs, so I would proffer that each of these programs have at least some true believers associated with them.

But perhaps I have missed your point entirely, in which case I apologize.

 

[meg]

Here's an update on the legislation: http://www.farmpolicy.com/?p=260#more-260

The Post writers pointed out that, “On the domestic side, Democrats stripped out some items that Bush and congressional Republicans ridiculed, but defied criticism on others. The final legislation will no longer fund peanut storage facilities and relief for spinach farmers harmed by product recalls. Nor will it aid Christmas tree farms, or beet or sugar cane growers. But it keeps $3.5 billion in agricultural assistance, less than the House and Senate had approved. It retains $500 million for wildfire emergencies, and $425 million for a rural schools and roads program that was set to expire.”

 

[Kerberos]

I'd like to second the thanks to Katana for this thread. I'm finding it fascinating, myself.

My own opinions about why we have farm subsidies:

1. Less than 10% of the land surface of the planet is farmable. This number is declining rapidly. In the US, over 100,000 hectares per year (out of 179,000,000 hectares total cropland) convert from farm to urban use. Worldwide farmland has decreased by over 1/3 over the last 40 years. The causes for this vary: urban growth, retirement of marginal land, erosion, and soil salinization are some of the reasons.

2. The population of the planet is increasing by about 1.2% (about 77 million) per year

3. American farmers are disappearing rapidly for a whole bunch of reasons.

1 and 2 combined together to result in world cropland per capita that has declined to now being only 0.27 ha per capita; in China only 0.08 ha now is available. 0.5 hectare per capita is considered minimal for a diverse diet similar to that of the U.S. and Europe.

1, 2 and 3 combined, if you think about them for a minute or two, make it clear why a country might choose to create programs that keep farmland as farmland and farmers farming, even if it means they grow too much food to feed all its fat little citizens for now. It could even be considered a matter of national security that a country that wishes to remain a world power maintain its ability to feed itself, and its allies, if need be.

As to which farmers and what farm products get subsidized, well, first off, you've got to watch out for the grain farmers, since that really is what feeds the world.. and if you look here: http://www.ewg.org/farm/farms_by_state.php you see that the majority of the the states which have a high rate of farms receiving subsidy payments are in the predominately grain producting states (ND, SD, NE, KS, IA, IL) After that, I think it doesn't really matter. The main idea is just to keep farms farms, and farmers farming, so they hand em out based on who's got the best lobbyists, or who's got the hardest luck story this year, I think.

And in the meantime, in a global way, big reserves of food are very handy, politically. You can give a bunch of it to hard pressed countries, which makes them have to be indebted to you, which gives you the power to influence them, as well as the upper hand in trade negotiations.

Or, as talked about by others, you can dump it in another country and thereby manipulate their market to your advantage.

Where are you getting that from? Seriously do you have any evidence whatsoever that there is or will anywhere in the future be a critical shortage of farmland? Yes the population is growing, and I'll accept your postulate that the farmed area is shrinking (and we will be all out in less than 2000 years if the present trend continue, oh noes!), but that is because productivity per acre is growing, something that is hardly an alarming trend. As for giving a surplus to hard pressed countries, it would be far easier, cheaper and more effective to just give them money. As for dumping your surplus in another country to manipulate their market in you favour, I'm just dying to know how, moral issues aside, promoting starvation, poverty and instability in Africa serves the strategic interest of the West?

 

[meg]

Kerberos wrote:

Where are you getting that from? Seriously do you have any evidence whatsoever that there is or will anywhere in the future be a critical shortage of farmland? Yes the population is growing, and I'll accept your postulate that the farmed area is shrinking (and we will be all out in less than 2000 years if the present trend continue, oh noes!), but that is because productivity per acre is growing, something that is hardly an alarming trend.

Hi Kerberos,

I don't have the time over the next few days to research my reply as thoroughly as I would like, but I can tell you a few statistics I know off the top of my head, and from some quick googling.

While our US crop yields per acre are indeed increasing, they do not match the increase in world population.

1980 population 4.5billion 2005 population 6 billion = 33% increase

However, for example:
1980 wheat yields averaged around 35b/a. 2005 avereaged around 45 b/a = 28% increase
soybeans have flattened out with the average US harvest from 1986 - 2005 hovering around 35b/a.

Corn has increased, (1980 corn yields averaged 90 b/a 2007 predictions expect 130 b/a = 44% increase) however, I don't know, but I suspect that a great deal of this increase has to do with the fact that more corn is being grown for animal feed rather than human consumption.

I am not attempting to create or support a real doomsday argument here. What I am trying to show is that it is easy to see that if you have one of the largest resources (that is a limited resource) in the world of something that everyone in the world needs, and that when they don't have it, they get violent and revolt before they starve to death, you would be a foolish world leader indeed if you failed to protect and support that resource to the best of your ability.

The timeline of our subsidizing the agriculture industry (I think) bears me out on this. The first big boost was the creation of the Federal Farm Board by Herbert Hoover. The food shortages both here and abroad during WWI were still quite strongly impressed in peoples minds. When the dustbowl hit a few years later, clobbering our already depressed agricultural sectors, assistance skyrocketed. I believe that Hoover and FDR after him understood that a strong and stable agricultural industry is one of the most important resources a country can have, and that it is of the utmost importance to protect and even encourage it.

As for giving a surplus to hard pressed countries, it would be far easier, cheaper and more effective to just give them money.

Well, sure.. if your goal was only to actually help those hard pressed countries become self sufficient. If your actual goal is to keep the American agriculture industry humming along, then giving money to hard pressed countries (or assisting them to become more self sufficient) doesn't do anything at all for you.

As for dumping your surplus in another country to manipulate their market in you favour, I'm just dying to know how, moral issues aside, promoting starvation, poverty and instability in Africa serves the strategic interest of the West?

It promotes the strategic interests of the west when we get to "bail them out of trouble" by becoming the major source of their food. We might choose to give it to them, and build up our pool of "allies", or we might choose to trade the food for other things we want; oil, textiles, cheap labor, the ability to build dangerous chemical plants there, install our military bases on their lands, whatever*.

*Just to be clear: I am not advocating this strategy. I just see how some people might see it this way. A country with an excess of food has the potential ability to completely dominate a country that doesn't have enough. Hungry people will do or agree to almost anything in order to get food.

And this, of course, is where the whole silly buggywhip argument falls apart. People don't revolt, economies don't crumble, and countries aren't ripe for takeover because they don't have enough buggywhips. People with plenty of buggywhips are not necessarily happy and complacent. Food, however, is a completely different story.

Being and maintaining a position as a world leader in food production is a powerful place to be.