Posted on 07/05/2006 1:10:32 PM PDT by Ebenezer
(NOTE: Online version not available)
Jim Salenski is a dairy farmer about 8 miles from the [Catholic] church in Rugby, [North Dakota]. He echoes a complaint heard from coast to coast that the federal government’s farm subsidy program is driving small farmers out of business.
Studies show that as much as three-quarters of the federal support goes to the top 10 percent of the producers, which include Fortune 500 companies, celebrities, and other “hobby farmer” investors. “The more you farm, the more you get,” Salenski sums up the government policy.
His German-Russian parents bought the farm in 1932. Jim, the last of 11 children, took it over when he married his wife Bernice in 1962.
“We’ve lost a lot of our family farms - and they were the backbone of our nation. The folks in Washington keep voting in favor of corporate farms and bigger operations, and put the squeeze on the smaller farmers. Some are getting a lot richer, while most are closing down their farm or selling it off.”
The federal government has been trying to aid American farmers since the 1930s and is currently discussing the renewal of the farm aid bill that costs taxpayers close to $750 million a year in subsidies and price supports.
Contrary to public awareness, relatively little of this money goes to the small family farmer, agrees Robert Gronski, policy director of the National Catholic Rural Life Conference (NCRLC), which was founded in 1923 as an advocate for “rural people, family farms and local businesses.”
At the same time, the larger farms are using their government bonuses to buy out the smaller struggling farmers - “accelerating the process” of the loss of family farms, says Gronski.
Salenski says another source of stress is coming from “recreation people” buying land for hunting and fishing. They are pushing land values - and hence taxes - up for farmers, too.
Salenski has raised 12 children - seven boys and five girls - but only one son and daughter remain at home. The other children have mostly moved out of the area to the state capital in Bismarck. Salenski hopes that his son will take over the family homestead, but he also understands why that may never happen as the economic times get harder.
The House Agriculture Committee is accepting public comments on the farm bill through December 2006. For more background, visit the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ website at http://www.usccb.org/sdwp/national/agriculture0406.html.
The NCRLC website at http://www.ncrlc.com also offers a collection of backgrounders, pastoral statements on rural issues as well as information on what parishes can do to support family farmers as well as environmental issues.
Aid to large factory farms is helping them to outcompete the little guys.
He made a lot of mistakes, didn't he? The biggest of them was not putting any stops in place, IMHO.
I rented to three young farmers trying to help them out. They cost me much money. My advice is rent to the big guy, there is a reason he is a big farmer.
That's simply not true. The subsidies raise the price all the domestic farmers get for what they produce. They aren't paying higher prices to large farms than small ones.
The large farms are more efficient and have taken over the majority of the farming industry because of that. Because they produce a high percentage of the crops, they receive ha high percentage of the money used to subsidize the prices.
However, it's definitely not making them more competitive against the small farmers.
If you were to remove the subsidies, the little farmers would be the first to collapse because since they are less efficient, it's harder for them to be profitable on lower margins.
These subsidies are what are keeping a lot of the small farmers alive. The small farmers need those subsidies more than the "factory farmers" as you called them.
The purpose of the subsidies is to maintain a farming industry in the US because it's in our national interest to not be too dependent on imports for our food. I'm not sure if the subsidies are really needed or if they could possibly be reduced, but they aren't tailored to benefit large scale farming. The nature of farming benefits large scale farming.
Yeah Ted turner needs those subsidies or the poor fellah would go under. LOL
No, ADM and the Death Tax is.
It is shocking how little goes to farmers. Works out to less than $3.00 per American.
Farmers are leaving the farms because they WANT to and because most of the young people want nothing to do with farming. This has been occurring for a hundred years. In EVERY country in the world.
I have no quarrel with tighter controls on ag aid, but the family farm, as a viable commodity producer for the USA and the world, is an anachronism. As a lifestyle or avocation, family farms have a place; otherwise, they are going the way of buggy whip makers and Chevrolet.
bigger is not always better.
The propose of the farm subsidies isn't to provide welfare benefits to farmers. It's to maintain the existence of an important national resource as I explained in my last post.
If farming isn't profitable, people will invest their money elsewhere and we will import our food rather than grow and raise it domestically.
If that's what you want, oppose the farm subsidies.
If you think that having a domestic farming industry is important enough to subsidize it, support farm subsidies.
We do in this country give small businesses some level of preferential treatment, however in many industries such as farming working on a large scale is simply much more efficient. That's simply reality.
My father grew up on a farm and watched the family farm become unprofitable over time and eventually get sold off.
I technically grew up on a farm, though farming was a part time endeavor for our family.
You appear to believe that we need to do something to help small farmers in this country. What do you propose? Are you suggesting that we just give money to small farmers? Should we make it more profitable to have small farms which are less efficient? Should we discourage small farms from growing? Should we spend more tax money to benefit fewer people?
Think it through and let's hear what you think should be done.
While there have always been those who have wanted to leave the life of farming behind, farming families tend to be large, and it only takes one member of the family to want to continue on the tradition to keep it going.
Small scale farming simply isn't very profitable anymore except in some niche markets. It's just too difficult for family farms to earn enough money to not only provide a reasonable standard of living but to allow the necessary constant reinvestment in the farm to keep it modern and competitive. Farming also has considerable risks involved and bad weather or disease can unexpectedly wipe out several years worth of profits, and small farms have a hard time weathering such bad times.
Large farms can weather them, but they need to make decent profits to justify the risk, or they're better off selling the land and investing in T bills.
Our domestic farming industry has a hard time competing with imported goods.
It also doesn't help matters that fresh water is starting to become a limiting resource in many areas due to population growth.
I think farm subsidies should be ended altogether or distributed more honestly. There is no reason for multi milionaire "farmers" like Ted Turner to get subsidies.
Working on farms gave me my first look at subsidies when we planted a crop only to plow it under a few weeks later because the check had arrived. Even the farmer said it didn't make sense but the government paid better for him not growing that crop than he could get on a glutted market.
It is definitely true that farming has become a capital intensive operation and is priced out of the means of most families. That trend is an important factor in the death of the family farm and is essentially irreversible.
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