Farmers do not exist in a vacuum. They actually talk to each other and they know a lot better then bureaucrats what grows well and what sells well.
Small farmers, who quite often are too small for the government to bother with, are perfect examples of what can be done. Somehow despite no government nanny running things farmers markets are filled with a variety of produce.
Not everyone is going to grow corn because not every place is good for growing corn.
And corn is not like lettuce, if you don't sell in one year you actually can hold it over until the next year.
The idea of "paying people not to grow something" is a hangover from FDR's stupidity and resulted in the last time American actually starved.
Government controls are actually what results in "boom bust cycles"
You see this in the dairy industry.
When did I say family farmers were stupid? That one’s on you.
You seem to think I am belittling farmers. Think again.
I care about farmers or I wouldn’t be addressing this issue at all.
Do you remember this?
Pressures are on the family farms in America. I don’t want polices to be ripped out from under them. If it can be shown that withdrawing government land bank subsidies will be better for farmers, by all means remove them.
I’m not convinced of that, and I said so.
I’d rather do that than have everyone saying the same thing on the thread and not give it some thought now, in real time.
Providing real timely and lucid responses to me and explaining the reasoning behind them, would have served to educate our forum members.
It’s unfortunate so many decided not to do that, being experts and all.