The Dodge Ram ad the aired during last Sunday’s Superbowl resonated with a lot of people - some in a good way, some in a bad way. The controversy appears to center around the fact that most/all of the farmers shown in the ad were white folks.
This article discusses the matter, and offers this tidbit:
Interestingly, they cite the number of “agricultural workers” or “farm workers”, rather than the “farmers” whom Paul Harvey was praising. My assumption was that he was talking about farm owners, who are the ones with the most at risk if the farm is badly run, and so are the ones we might expect to work the hardest to keep the place running on an even keel.
Which, finally, brings me to my question:
How does farm ownership in the US break down along racial lines? Do Latinos own a lot of farms? Actually, do many families/individuals of any stripe still own farms, or are family-owned farms something of a minority in themselves now?
There have been claims that black farmers were discriminated against in loans, so perhaps this meant that they lost their farms more often and thus are a smaller proportion of farmers than was previously the case:
I think they were just showing a representation of what most people think of when they think of farmers. That’s what farmers look like around where I live. I’m a part time farmer.
Us Black Folk, for the most part, ditched the farming life for factory work and the excitement of the northern cities during the 1st and 2nd Great Migrations. There are still some Black farmers out there, but it’s no longer a common thing.
I should have been more specific in my OP. The controversy wasn’t so much that the farmers depicted were mostly white folks; instead, the controversy was that virtually none of them were Latino. There doesn’t seem to have been much outcry from black or Asian cultural groups, but some Latino groups seem quite bothered.
Actually I think I just found what I’m looking for here:
They use the term “farm operator,” which - given the disparity in percentages - is clearly distinct from the “agricultural worker” statistic cited by NBC News.
The only people that I personally know that currently own a farm here in the US are Amish, and they are most definitely white. This is in the Mid-Atlantic US.
How about in Puerto Rico? How many ethnically Latino Puerto Ricans own PR farms and grow sugarcane and tobacco? There is most certainly farming there - are all the farms owned by companies and/or Anglo farmers?
I grew up on a ranch in South Dakota and many of our neighbors/friends have at least some Lakota heritage.
I want to comment on the family vs. corporate farm thing. The farming and ranching operations that I know of in that area are both family farms and corporations. Margins are low so operations continually get bigger to survive. They incorporate for tax and inheritance purposes like any other family owned small business. The days of the old McDonald style of operation have been over since the thirties.
There are a few rare examples of wealthy individuals who don’t run the operations personally. I don’t know of any farming or ranching operations that are non-family owened corporations. The investor owned corporations are further up the food chain.
Just like many other areas of life, the public perception and media’s portrayal of agriculture is over simplified and does not match reality very well. Personally I found the ad overly sentimental.