Farm Subsidies...Is it time for reform OR the ending of them? (generations, Mexican)

[muleskinner]

Originally Posted by parfleche

wow a freakin dually nice ride ha ha

[jfields]

Originally Posted by muleskinner

I agree...NAFTA and all of this free trade bullshyt has done exactly what it was designed to do...allow big business to move to third world countries for free labor and then turn around and send the crap back to us for our dollars to buy.

I think we should go back like it used to be...we pay OUR tarriffs and "they" pay their's.

Our country was a proud nation of farmers,builders and manufacturers for quite a spell with that way of doing business,now our kids work at McDonald's,Wal-Mart and other crap jobs and wear Chinese made junk clothing.

We need to become exporters of GOODS once again instead of just exporting our jobs.

I agree with pretty much everything you've written here. I just want to point out 1 thing. The we pay our tarriffs and they pay theirs could lead to a trade war if it is purely protectionist.

What we should do, in my opinion, is embrace the fair trade model for trading with other countries and selectively use tarriffs to reward socially responsible business and punish social irresponsibility. For example, to stop the megafarms from buying out big plots of land in third world countries and using slave labor to make their products cheap enough to run the little guy out of business in the US, certain wage, labor and environmental standards should be met. We should demand that Mexico, or any other country that we trade with for that matter, should pay their workers a living wage, use environmentally sustainable farming methods and respect their workers right to unionize if they choose to do so. We would have to meet the same standards too of course.

I think need for certain products should be taken into account when decisions are being made about tarriffs. For example if the United States can't grow enough avocados to meet our demand, import those avocados tarriff free by all means. But if sales of tomatoes are down, we might want to have a safegard so that the tomato farmers don't loose their income. Then if the decreasing tomato sales become more of a permanent thing, the tomato farmers can switch crops. But at least there should be temporary safegaurd so that the tomato farmers can support themselves.

I also think that the govenments of both countries should have programs to help family farmers and co-ops export their products as well. Many Latin American countries that the US now has free trade agreements with
went through periods of agrarian reform where the goverment re-disributed land so that landless peasents could survive; Mexico did this on several occasions between the 1910 revolution and the 1970's, Chile did this during the 1960's and the beginning of the 1970's and Nicaragua did this during the 1980's. However, after these land reforms, all 3 countries (I'm sure other countries had the same experience as well) went through periods of neo-liberal economic reform and big corporate agrobusiness interests, like the ones in the US that recieve huge subsidies, moved their operations and/or exported to these countries and threatened to drive the little guys out. Because of this, many small farmers have formed co-ops in order to get export capacity to ofset their inablility to sell in their own markets.

I don't have any problem with small co-ops like this exporting their products to the United States with little or no tarriffs. This helps them make ends meet, making it less likely that they will pack up and leave their native land out of desperation and immigrate to the United States illegally; so there are mutual benefits here. What I have a problem with are the huge multinationals going to third world countries, exploiting the workers, the environment, and paying rock bottom salaries; then they turn around and dump their cheap products on the US market, causing hardship for US family farmers in the process.

[muleskinner]

Originally Posted by jfields

I agree with pretty much everything you've written here. I just want to point out 1 thing. The we pay our tarriffs and they pay theirs could lead to a trade war if it is purely protectionist.

What we should do, in my opinion, is embrace the fair trade model for trading with other countries and selectively use tarriffs to reward socially responsible business and punish social irresponsibility. For example, to stop the megafarms from buying out big plots of land in third world countries and using slave labor to make their products cheap enough to run the little guy out of business in the US, certain wage, labor and environmental standards should be met. We should demand that Mexico, or any other country that we trade with for that matter, should pay their workers a living wage, use environmentally sustainable farming methods and respect their workers right to unionize if they choose to do so. We would have to meet the same standards too of course.

I think need for certain products should be taken into account when decisions are being made about tarriffs. For example if the United States can't grow enough avocados to meet our demand, import those avocados tarriff free by all means. But if sales of tomatoes are down, we might want to have a safegard so that the tomato farmers don't loose their income. Then if the decreasing tomato sales become more of a permanent thing, the tomato farmers can switch crops. But at least there should be temporary safegaurd so that the tomato farmers can support themselves.

I also think that the govenments of both countries should have programs to help family farmers and co-ops export their products as well. Many Latin American countries that the US now has free trade agreements with
went through periods of agrarian reform where the goverment re-disributed land so that landless peasents could survive; Mexico did this on several occasions between the 1910 revolution and the 1970's, Chile did this during the 1960's and the beginning of the 1970's and Nicaragua did this during the 1980's. However, after these land reforms, all 3 countries (I'm sure other countries had the same experience as well) went through periods of neo-liberal economic reform and big corporate agrobusiness interests, like the ones in the US that recieve huge subsidies, moved their operations and/or exported to these countries and threatened to drive the little guys out. Because of this, many small farmers have formed co-ops in order to get export capacity to ofset their inablility to sell in their own markets.

I don't have any problem with small co-ops like this exporting their products to the United States with little or no tarriffs. This helps them make ends meet, making it less likely that they will pack up and leave their native land out of desperation and immigrate to the United States illegally; so there are mutual benefits here. What I have a problem with are the huge multinationals going to third world countries, exploiting the workers, the environment, and paying rock bottom salaries; then they turn around and dump their cheap products on the US market, causing hardship for US family farmers in the process.

DAMMIT!!!! I repped you to early...I should have repped THIS post

I agree with your entire post...I'm not for a trade war and you are right,across the board tarriffs could cause that.I admit that I did not think of that.

[Mike from back east]

Originally Posted by muleskinner

I hauled cattle long distance for a living for quite a spell and the U.S. taxpayer would be SHOCKED to know whose pockets they are lining with these subsidies....the "mask" that they and the politicians whose pockets they line want you to see is one of a poor old dirt farmer that we are helping....that is total bullcrap....I hauled for a dude that OWNED almost 40 trucks at an average of $125.000 a piece,40 trailers at $55,000 a piece,8 GIANT feedlots that were worth millions upon millions of dollars just for the ground alone(not including the facilities) and he had over 4000 head of fat cows at any one time.....this doesn't include the mansions that he,his kids and relatives all owned,plus vacation places,hundreds of pickups,tractors,heavy equipment ad nauseum.

This guy had his places split up and different business names and all of his relatives leaching off the farm susidy programs PLUS making money hand over fist in transport and cattle sales.

I heard he got busted for some shady practices after I left and I know for a fact that the DOT shut his butt down on the transport side,but all the same,this fellow built an empire off of YOUR money and he is the kind of guy you see when that "mask" is pulled away.

Today, farmers are THE highest paid group of Americans, that ought to tell people something.

Poster Jfields said a mouthful, so I repped him/her for you. Jfields speaks to NAFTA, so here's a lesser known fact about NAFTA. Because OUR farms are so heavily subsidized, once NAFTA passed and trade became easier, OUR big agri-biz firms were able to sell OUR cheap corn and grain to Mexico at very low prices, so much so that it put an estimated TWO MILLION Mexican farm workers out of work.

GUESS what country those 2,000,000 Mexican farm workers snuck into in order to make a living for their families....

Bend over America....

[HappyTexan]

Originally Posted by ovcatto

I'm am way out of my depth when it comes to farm subsidies and I only have a gut feeling that something is rotten in Kansas so I am dying for any links, articles or substantiatable opinions about the issue.

So here's a state by state database with top receipants but those are in the "farm" names.

EWG || Farm Subsidy Database

Here's an article that traced down some of the true owners:
How Farm Subsidies Harm Taxpayers, Consumers, and Farmers, Too
Ten Reasons to Cut Farm Subsidies | Chris Edwards | Cato Institute: Daily Commentary

The way it's run right now you could cut farm subsidies big time and the only people really effected are the agri-corps. The small farmer gets nothing and the mid size farmer gets very little.

[HappyTexan]

Originally Posted by Mike from back east

Today, farmers are THE highest paid group of Americans, that ought to tell people something.

Poster Jfields said a mouthful, so I repped him/her for you. Jfields speaks to NAFTA, so here's a lesser known fact about NAFTA. Because OUR farms are so heavily subsidized, once NAFTA passed and trade became easier, OUR big agri-biz firms were able to sell OUR cheap corn and grain to Mexico at very low prices, so much so that it put an estimated TWO MILLION Mexican farm workers out of work.

GUESS what country those 2,000,000 Mexican farm workers snuck into in order to make a living for their families....

Bend over America....

This is agri-corps though and they don't need those subsidies.

The small to mid size farms can use them but they don't get much.

Still at the Federal Trough: Farm Subsidies for the Rich and Famous Shattered Records in 2001

This is old but I know I've seen a newer one..same big corp names though:


And here's people that get farm subsidies:

[jfields]

Originally Posted by Mike from back east

Today, farmers are THE highest paid group of Americans, that ought to tell people something.

Poster Jfields said a mouthful, so I repped him/her for you. Jfields speaks to NAFTA, so here's a lesser known fact about NAFTA. Because OUR farms are so heavily subsidized, once NAFTA passed and trade became easier, OUR big agri-biz firms were able to sell OUR cheap corn and grain to Mexico at very low prices, so much so that it put an estimated TWO MILLION Mexican farm workers out of work.

GUESS what country those 2,000,000 Mexican farm workers snuck into in order to make a living for their families....

Bend over America....

I had read somewhere that over 1 million farm jobs had been lost due to NAFTA, but I just did a quick check and it looks like the information that I had was outdated. I found this article that says that 1.5 million farm jobs have been lost due to NAFTA and the article is 3 years old. Being that the gradual elimination of the corn tarriff was completed in 2008, I'd guess that the 2 million figure is accurate. Here's the article by the way.

NAFTA & Dumping Subsidized Corn on Mexico Has Driven 1.5 Million Farmers off the Land & Forced Millions to Migrate

The part that really gets me is the guy from the Heritage Foundation that says, and I'm paraphrasing here, that people lose jobs and get displaced by globalization which is happening in Mexico but that's progress. 2 million farmers lost their livelyhood! How the hell is this progress? And, just like you and the article said, these people who are desperate to make ends meet immigrate to the US illegally.

Now let me just analyze this for a moment. Large megarich farms dump their products, which are artificially cheap due to government subsidies, on the Mexican market. US taxpayers money, which comes from rich, middle class and poor, is given as welfare payments to rich farmers; the wealth is being redistributed upward. These rich farmers dump their products on Mexico, running 2 million people, which are mainly small farmers, out of business. Many of these farmers have no way to make ends meet in Mexico so they risk their lives to come to the United States and work illegally. Although these workers don't come to the US to drive down wages, the illegal immigration problem has done just that. Alot of Americans are angry, and rightfully so, because businesses prefer to hire illegal immigrants instead of them because hiring an illegal immigrant drives down the businesses labor costs. But alot of these angry Americans take their anger out on the illegal immigrants because the only thing they know about them is that the illegal immigrants are causing wages to decline, which has a negitive effect on the American. All of a sudden, the illegal immigrant can see that alot of Americans are hostile toward him when the only reason he is in the United States is because a US megafarm, heavily subsidized by the US taxpayer, made it impossible for him to sell his products. The fact that the American doesn't speak Spanish and the illegal immigrant doesn't speak English makes it impossible for them to communicate and resolve their differences. So what we have here are two different working class people from 2 different countries that are not on friendly terms to say the least, but they are both got screwed over by the same people; the corporations that are worried about nothing more than their bottom line, which is making as much money as possible.

[cdne]

Nations around the world subsize their farmers to protect their own food supply. When America quits protecting their farmers, then get ready to import your food, settle for picked-green-and-ripened-in-container foods from overseas, see empty shelves at the local grocery store, or see food increase to a greater percentage of disposable income due to corporate takeovers.

The average age of the American farmer is approaching 60, and there aren't many young ones getting into the business because of land values, equipment costs, and skyrocketing cost of seed, fertilizer, fuel, and all related items needed to produce a crop. If farming is such a lucrative profession, then why are more farmers quitting, and few new ones getting into the business?

Granted,...there are abuses of the system, but when the subsidy program is removed and American farmers have to compete with foreign growers who ARE heavily subsidized by their governments, it will be the consumer who suffers.

[PurpleLove08]

Eh...something is seriously wrong when it's cheaper to buy a burger than it is a pound of fruit.

In any case, I try my best to support the local farmers.
It doesn't make sense that in the local big box store they have fruits shipped all the way from CA when farmers here in AR can grow the same thing.

[jfields]

Originally Posted by cdne

Nations around the world subsize their farmers to protect their own food supply. When America quits protecting their farmers, then get ready to import your food, settle for picked-green-and-ripened-in-container foods from overseas, see empty shelves at the local grocery store, or see food increase to a greater percentage of disposable income due to corporate takeovers.

The average age of the American farmer is approaching 60, and there aren't many young ones getting into the business because of land values, equipment costs, and skyrocketing cost of seed, fertilizer, fuel, and all related items needed to produce a crop. If farming is such a lucrative profession, then why are more farmers quitting, and few new ones getting into the business?

Granted,...there are abuses of the system, but when the subsidy program is removed and American farmers have to compete with foreign growers who ARE heavily subsidized by their governments, it will be the consumer who suffers.

I don't think I've read anything from anyone saying that we should eliminate subsidies completely. I, along with most on this thread I believe, think that we should be helping out the little guys instead of the huge megafarms.