I way, way too frequently miss stuff on my first read through.
Anyway, in light of your work on meals ready to eat, whenever someone talks about the dangers of processed food, I like to exclaim “We won World War II on Spam!”
It usually gets a laugh, which is fun for everybody. 
Are you saying that $16 billion spent on subsidies in the US has a serious price effect on the more than $1.2 trillion (PDF!) spent yearly in this country on food?
I just don’t see it, even if the entirety of that subsidy was used for price support… which it isn’t.
Our food processing and distribution system is one of the things that makes America virtually unstoppable. Think about it, with all the transportation disruptions we have had in the last few years, have you been to a store that didn’t have food on the shelves? People in locally affected areas experienced temporary shortages, but for the most part, we all have access to more than enough food. I have to admit, though, I never considered SPAM a weapon before. Thanks for giving me something new to ponder.
The full amount of the subsidies is going to be much higher than that, because it will include more than just direct federal subsidies. For example, in Michigan all agricultural land gets an 18-mil break on property taxes. There’s a lot of subsidies that aren’t direct payments, although I really just enjoy taking any opportunity to complain about ag subsidies. So, thanks for the point to ponder: it’s something worth looking up.
Regardless, the point about food price and activity remains. Food production has seen vast improvements in efficiency without a corresponding drop in crop land or rise in demand. So many farmers have trouble because of the fall in commodity prices that has occured as a result. I think a relevant reference is Lakdwalla & Philipson (2002) The Growth of Obesity and Technological Change: A Theoretical and Empirical Investigation. NBER working paper.