286 billion Farm Aid Bill for 2008

[PLOlover]

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Also, why should we waste money year in and year out subsiding farmers for an event that is extremely unlikely to happen?

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uh, because lots of people woul die? I mean it's no different than insurance I guess. having said that the farm subsidy should probably be 28 billion, not 280 billion.

[Money2Burn]

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because if ten units of producting meets demand, risk of overproduction is bad, and underproduction actually makes more money, so it will skew production down a bit.


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This doesn't happen because farmers are greedy. I can tell you exactly what happens because I've seen t happen for years. One year there is a surplus of food, prices are extremely low, farmers lose tons of money, the next year farmers are going to plant less because they don't want to get burned again, but wait I'm no fool, if all my neighbors are cutting their production that means prices are going to be high so I'll just plant more acres to make a killing. So this happens, but most farmers end up doing it and supply is too high again. It's human nature, it's competition, it's capitalism.

[bobman0330]

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Widespread famines stopped happening in the 18th century because of improvements in transportation.

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Ireland has already been mentioned. China during the Great leap forward, Ethiopia in the mid 1980s, North Korea in the 1990s, USSR in the 1920s, and 1930s, and 1947, and India

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There were approximately 25 major famines spread through states such as Tamil Nadu in the south, and Bihar and Bengal in the east during the latter half of the 19th century.

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From the wiki article. web page

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It's almost inconceivable that such a thing could happen today. If the US can't grow enough wheat, we can just buy it from Canada, or the Ukraine, or Argentina.

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Don't worry about that, tariffs and trade wars have overcome need for thens of millions of people.

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Heh, that was sort of a dumb thing to say. What it would be more accurate to say is that modern famines are usually only caused by huge catastrophes or government intervention. Simple "Oops I forgot to plant enough corn!" is not going to create much of a blip in the market.

[PLOlover]

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This doesn't happen because farmers are greedy. I can tell you exactly what happens because I've seen t happen for years. One year there is a surplus of food, prices are extremely low, farmers lose tons of money, the next year farmers are going to plant less because they don't want to get burned again, but wait I'm no fool, if all my neighbors are cutting their production that means prices are going to be high so I'll just plant more acres to make a killing. So this happens, but most farmers end up doing it and supply is too high again. It's human nature, it's competition, it's capitalism.

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maybe, but with everying consolidated with big agribusiness, I think it would be more like opec. of course most of the time opec countries overproduce too. the problem of course is that is underproduction every happens people get real upset with high food prices and/or shortages/rationing.

[Money2Burn]

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Also, why should we waste money year in and year out subsiding farmers for an event that is extremely unlikely to happen?

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uh, because lots of people woul die? I mean it's no different than insurance I guess. having said that the farm subsidy should probably be 28 billion, not 280 billion.

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If there was an event that hurt the food supply to such an extent that lots of people were actually going hungry, it wouldn't matter how many acres you planted ahead of time. I really don't think you understand the nature of this industry. The industry demands much much more than the bare minimum that people need to survive WITHOUT government intervention. Even during the worst growing years we are far from having the kind of shortages you are talking about. Also food storage techniques are getting incredibly good so it is nearly impossible for there to be widespread famine in our society.

[PLOlover]

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If there was an event that hurt the food supply to such an extent that lots of people were actually going hungry, it wouldn't matter how many acres you planted ahead of time. I really don't think you understand the nature of this industry. The industry demands much much more than the bare minimum that people need to survive WITHOUT government intervention. Even during the worst growing years we are far from having the kind of shortages you are talking about. Also food storage techniques are getting incredibly good so it is nearly impossible for there to be widespread famine in our society.

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well he said extremely unlikely, almost always just higher prices or rationing I guess. I mean there was rationing in WW2. also I read that today there is only a 17 day food supply stored, 1950 it was like 250 days or someting.

I mean this is a thing to look at inthe real world, but theoretically I don't see how a free market force won't maximize profits, which means limiting supply.

I mean I just don't get how getting a bunch of enron type guys in charge of the food supply won't result in higher prices and the occasional way way higher prices.

having said that I think it is a boondoggle and the 280 billion shlould be 28 bill or less.

It's probably ;llike health care universal, suonds great but really sucks and should be cut way back or done away with.

[manbearpig]

It is getting a little late for me and there are a lot of zeros, but if you divide $286 billion by 300 million people, thats like $953 a person.

I hope my math is right or else I am going to feel like a retard, but that is a whole hell of a lot of money for people to pay for farmers to farm inefficiently.

[Money2Burn]

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also I read that today there is only a 17 day food supply stored, 1950 it was like 250 days or someting.


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This probably had to do with the cold war. I don't know where your figures come from for the 17 day food come from, but I would tend to suspect if we had to we could survive for much longer. My only basis for this though is my knowlege of how much/long companies like Frito Lay can store some food.

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I mean this is a thing to look at inthe real world, but theoretically I don't see how a free market force won't maximize profits, which means limiting supply.

I mean I just don't get how getting a bunch of enron type guys in charge of the food supply won't result in higher prices and the occasional way way higher prices.


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There are several reasons I could point to that this isn't the case, but I think the most important one is that there are little to no barriers to entry into the market. Unless you can buy up all the farmable land then there will always be people who can begin farming if prices are high.

Also this is kind of a humorous aside to me, but lol at thinking farmers are anything like Enron executives. Even the Duda's who own one of the largest vegetable growing operations in the world would probably be considered backwoods hicks by most people who post on these boards.

[ianlippert]

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well he said extremely unlikely, almost always just higher prices or rationing I guess. I mean there was rationing in WW2. also I read that today there is only a 17 day food supply stored, 1950 it was like 250 days or someting.


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Then what we need is emergency rations stored not yearly farm subsidies. Problem solved.

[mccreadj]

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Also this is kind of a humorous aside to me, but lol at thinking farmers are anything like Enron executives. Even the Duda's who own one of the largest vegetable growing operations in the world would probably be considered backwoods hicks by most people who post on these boards.

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so you're saying farmers=backwood hicks? I don't get this anti-rural bias I see on these boards and from most people under 30.