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Agricultural production in that territory once known as “the United States of America” is a badly managed and very clumsy football to be playing a game with.

Agricultural employment used to be a very poorly paid, very hard line of work. The increasing mechanization of all aspects of agriculture replaced all these poorly paid workers, and left them free to seek employment in much better paying manufacturing and construction work, and thus the rural districts quickly emptied out. The transportation industry got a huge boost, as the points of agricultural production were moved further and further from the points of consumption.

But in the midst of this much greater specialization of labor, the country fell into the Great Depression, and the days of the New Deal found there was just “too much” production of grains and slaughter animals, so huge numbers of beef, dairy, swine, sheep, and even horses were slaughtered and dumped into huge land-disposal pits. The excess grains were bought up and put into storage, and farmers were given subsidies to NOT produce more grain, but let the land lie fallow. Of course this led to its own set of abuses, but the positive side of things is that the agricultural industry had plenty of room for vast expansion as WW II cranked up. America not only produced prodigious numbers of machinery and men in arms, they also produced quantities in vast excess to feed this army of soldiers and industrial laborers. So much so, that when it got to be too much of a good thing, large quantities of food were simply left to rot at military depots all over the world.

The Germans who were captured near the end of WW II were surprised that GIs at the front lines were so well fed, and it was noted, that if Americans could eat so well under wartime conditions, Germany has already surely lost the war. The GIs, of course, griped at the sameness and relative unattractive prospect of reconstituted milk, reconstituted eggs and Spam every day at chow, but to the captured Germans this was a virtual feast.

Then suddenly, the war ended, and the agricultural industry was still cranking out vast surpluses of food stuffs and raw fiber. This had to be tamped down, so enter the purchase of excess commodities, such as dried milk and cheese, a way to control dairy production, and with all this excess dairy product, the government chose to simply give away food to those unable, for whatever reason, to go to the market and purchase their own. In spite of the Federal Government’s best efforts, the glut continued, and with it the prices remained suppressed, so the next step was to again severely limit production. The commodities distribution was discontinued with the advent of food stamps, and the production controls soon led to a vast drop of dairying and cattle numbers.

I know this up close and ugly because I used to be one of those small dairy farmers, and there was practically no return on the milking of cows. The real wealth accrued came from the sale of excess stock, primarily young castrated male cattle, raised for “dairy beef”. After all, where did you think McDonalds got the bulk of their hamburger from? It was not from prize Angus or Herefords, which are considered to be prime slaughter animals, and command a much higher price at the market place. That is why, for years, burgers and cheeseburgers were available for well under a dollar.

And that, gentle people, is your Agricultural Economics lesson for today. There will be a ten-point quiz later on, which shall count toward your final grade.