The 2013 farm bill presents a real opportunity for substantive changes in U.S. agricultural policy. But instead of reform, both the House and Senate agricultural committees are offering classic bait-and-switch proposals to protect farm subsidies — more than 80 percent of which flow to households much wealthier than the average American family. As I discuss
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Fake savings: The 2013 House farm bill
The House agriculture committee passed its version of the 2013 farm bill on May 15. Like the Senate agriculture committee, the House agriculture committee is selling its bill as a bipartisan deficit-reduction measure that saves tax payer dollars on farm subsidy spending while introducing new programs to improve risk management for farmers. As the bill
A new bait and switch farm bill
The Senate agriculture committee passed its version of the 2013 farm bill on May 14. Though sold as a deficit-reduction measure that maintains key supports for farmers, the bill’s numbers deserve a closer look as it heads to the Senate floor next week. The new bill does get one thing right: eliminating the Direct Payments
Ignoring trade commitments and trade relations only hurts our credibility
Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in The Hill. For many years, a persistent theme in House and Senate Agricultural Committee debates over farm policy has been “Give the farm lobbies the subsidy programs they want and the heck with the consequences for U.S. trade relations.” Nothing reflects that attitude better than the recent history
Moving towards a more rational farm policy: A real opportunity for bipartisan collaboration
A remarkable thing has happened on the way to a 2013 Farm Bill. Senator Harry Reid and Senator Debbie Stabenow, chair of the Senate Agricultural Committee, along with other Democrats on the committee, have recently proposed a sequestration related Farm Bill. The Bill would terminate the $5 billion a year Direct Payments program, which has
Sweets for the sweet? Get your extra costly candies for Valentine’s Day
Times change and not everything remains the same. Would that were true about the U.S. sugar program. Valentine’s Day is here again and every lover who buys his or her significant other a box of candy will pay just a little bit more for the privilege because of sugar quotas that generally guarantee sugar cane
US farm policy: We know where we have been, but do we know where we are going?
In the United States, the federal government has been involved with, and provided subsidies for, farmers and the agriculture sector since at least 1862, when the Morrell Act established the Land Grant University system to encourage both agricultural research and education. Beginning in 1933, with the Agricultural Adjustment Act, farm policy became increasingly focused on
Congress shouldn’t sneak farm bill into fiscal cliff deal
By Vince Smith and Scott Faber As Congress and the White House wrestle over how to come up with $4 trillion in spending cuts and tax increases, the last thing they need is a distracting and ill-timed skirmish over whether to throw a $1 trillion farm bill package into the mix. The farm bill food
No new farm bill: Is it really a national catastrophe?
The expiration of the provisions of the 2008 farm bill on September 30 would seem to be a national catastrophe, at least according to a broad coalition of U.S. farm groups, Senator Debbie Stabenow (the chair of the Senate Agricultural Committee) and Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. So what cold, hard threats to the
Rich farmers don’t need farm bill’s welfare
By most standards, farmers are rich. For a long time, the average family farm has enjoyed a higher income and has been six or seven times wealthier than the average American family. And the average farmer does not receive most of the farm subsidies that flow from the federal government. Eighty percent of those funds
