No we aren’t. We are talking about some ridiculous idea to stop exporting grain to make the midwest a petting zoo for buffalo.
There is nothing in this OP or any of the follow-up posts supporting it that indicate an even rudimentary understanding of economics.
You cannot isolate a single industry and say “hey…what if we reduced production by some arbitrary number? The resulting price increases will be a boon to the farmers and make those countries wealthy!” It won’t. If my country can buy grain (or whatever) more cheaply overseas, then that frees up resources -money and labor - to produce other things. Yeah…it sucks if you are a farmer in those countries. Maybe it’s time to look for new work.
Having farms closer to urban centers will not lower energy consumption. What % of energy consumption is involved in transporting grain to market? Not much compared to the consumption of 200 million commuters. Farm products are just thrown on a train and sent across country.
And finally, if you lower grain production, it would raise demand for substitutes like rice, not meat and fish. Gee, I think I’ll have a tuna sandwhich but instead of bread I’ll use two slabs of ham.
The US has used this excess wheat to supply shortages in several countries… Russia some times… some goes to African famine relief. Overall its good that the US has this cheap surplus wheat. I didnt know they subsidized it thou.
No we aren’t. We are talking about some ridiculous idea to stop exporting grain to make the midwest a petting zoo for buffalo.
There is nothing in this OP or any of the follow-up posts supporting it that indicate an even rudimentary understanding of economics.
You cannot isolate a single industry and say “hey…what if we reduced production by some arbitrary number? The resulting price increases will be a boon to the farmers and make those countries wealthy!” It won’t. If my country can buy grain (or whatever) more cheaply overseas, then that frees up resources -money and labor - to produce other things. Yeah…it sucks if you are a farmer in those countries. Maybe it’s time to look for new work.
Having farms closer to urban centers will not lower energy consumption. What % of energy consumption is involved in transporting grain to market? Not much compared to the consumption of 200 million commuters. Farm products are just thrown on a train and sent across country.
And finally, if you lower grain production, it would raise demand for substitutes like rice, not meat and fish. Gee, I think I’ll have a tuna sandwhich but instead of bread I’ll use two slabs of ham.
Do you want to go over all the posts in this thread which talk about American agricultural practices and policies and the effect they may or may not have on world markets?
and many of the posts that follow, including mine where I propose ending farming subsidies.
Nah, in my school only really poor students (or people transfering from another state) were taking Economics and Development in 11th or 12th grade- because it was a class required for 9th graders.
I think you’re on to something. But why stop at wheat? Why don’t we stop exporting everything to the 3rd world and then those countries could be paradise on earth, producing everything they need cheaply.
Paul in Saudi, I was not correcting your post by telling you it was off topic. I was explaining why I said the USA should stop subsidies. You pointed out the EU does it too and my post was meant to indicate why I only mentioned the USA, not to correct anything you had said. I know the Eu does it too but I felt no need to mention that since this thread is about US policies. That’s all.
I’d like to point out that from this USDA document:
World Wheat Production: 520.3 Million tons
World Wheat Consumption: 564.4 Million tons
World Wheat deficit: 44.1 Million tons
US Wheat Exports: 24.0 Million ton
The removal of 54% of the required wheat supply would be devastating to importing countries such as Brazil, Egypt, South Korea etc.
Goodness, and no one yet has talked about the devastating effect on the American economy of ending the farming of millions of acres of the central plains? Virtually the entire economies of Nebraska, the Dakotas, Kansas, Iowa and Missouri are devoted to grain and soybean production; it supports almost all the population, not just the farmers, but those living in the cities as well. Can we imagine what Lincoln, Neb. or Kansas City would be like without any grain production? Even the removal of a significant portion of the plains from farming would seriously depress the economy.
If people in the third world couldn’t buy cheap imported grain, the farmers in those countries would make more money, because people would have to pay their higher prices. The farmers get wealthier, yes? But where does the wealth for the farmers come from? It comes from the higher prices everyone else has to pay! Meaning, farmers get richer, everyone else gets poorer.
People in grain importing countries would on the average become poorer, since they would have to purchase grain at higher prices, and grain would be in shorter supply. End result, more third world poverty.
But I agree that ending farm subsidies is a good idea, and if people want to buy unused cropland and turn it into wilderness that is fine with me. Heck, I’d even support the US government buying land and converting it to national parks and such. However, this will reverse more than a hundred years of economic policy, which was to encourage farming and settlement of the plains. We paid people to move there with free land (via homesteading), subsidized services, and agricultural subsidies. It wouldn’t be easy politically to stop this quickly. People in the plains states vote, and they get their pork like everyone else.
I take it you passed over Econ 101 in favour of English Lit?
First off, if economics is not a zero-sum game. Farmers getting richer does not entail everyone else getting poorer. Indeed, the opposite is quite likely to be the case - farmers getting richer will result in most everyone getting richer. Farmers, after all, don’t hoard their money in coffee cans under the bed, but spend it, frequently on expensive capital goods. Just the sort of thing to boost an overall economy.
Second, an increase in global grain prices would stimulate agricultural activity in most countries which currently rely on imports, and most especially the subset of the above which are poor as they by and large have the largest growth potential in their agricultural sectors, and would gain the greatest incentive to expand production. (The exceptions are the few countries which currently use advanced agriculture, but which just have an insufficient land base to feed everyone. Japan, for example.) Currently, American (and other subsidised) farmers are undercutting the prices of many third world farmers, effectively driving them out of business, because of the massive subsidies they receive. Agricultural output in many poor countries could grow substantially, but as there is no economic incentive for people to grow more than they themselves can eat, it doesn’t happen.
Third, paying higher prices for food to local farmers will do far, far more for a nation’s economy than paying lower prices for food to foreign farmers.
The OP presents a ludicrous idea, but dropping agricultural subsidies (and yes, I know the EU is the biggest offender here, but the US isn’t far behind) would be a grand idea.
Re: Grey’s point regarding wheat consumption outstripping supply the last few years - that’s just an anomoly created by some nasty-ass weather. It will pass. Unless you think global warming is happening really, really fast.
I made the post becuase the distorting effects of the huge subsidies (in the EU and the USA) have cause a huge distortion of the world economy. The fact is, both the EU and the USA have overproduced grain for years…this has meant:
-high taxes to pay the subsidies
-lower prices for grain, leading 3rd world farmers to abandon grain growing (look at Afghanistan, where farmers grow OPIUM, becuase grain crops are unprofitable
In the main though, these policies have lead to unsustainabale practices (like the destruction of the Ogallala Aquifer). This will come back to haunt us!
Finally, returning parst of the Graet Plains to a wild state would be a good thing-it would allow some native species to survive!
The plains of the mid-west only produce cereals via the hip-pocket benevolence of East ands West coast consumers.
My family can grow and ship to the nearest export terminal wheat, barley and rice for less than the average US grower is paid in subsidies.
“the devastating effect on the American economy?” Bullshit. A magor stimulous after a short term (likely severe) reconstruction, decades of indulgence can’t, unfortunately, be reversed without some pain.
The US Farm Bill (and it’s associated Export Enhancement Program and the equally odious EEC programs) simply exports the cost of their agrarian social programs.
Why should the US give a rat’s about that? Imagine the stimulous to the US economy if those countries were able to sell their produce at their real value rather than the US/EEC corrupted prices and used that cash to purchasing value added products the US (and EEC) are actually efficient at producing? Might be the odd security spin-off too …
Hmmm, so much ignorance, wooly about what it is that grain production supports.
You might wish to read up on what corn is used for (not to mention other grains such as wheat). Damn little of it is used as “food” in the traditional sense (you know, corn in frozen packages you buy in the store, corn flakes, etc.). Most of it is used in other aspects of food production, like corn syrup (usually the number one or two ingredient in most packaged foods, we do like our foods sweet!). And food uses only include 10% of all US corn production!. 50% of corn is used to feed animals, 22% is exported and 10% is kept is reserves in case of bad crop years. Seeds, alchohol production and industrial uses make up the remainder.
We can argue quite reasonably about farm subsidies (I am personally not in favor of our current program; I think it is bad for both farmers and consumers), but the concept of removing substantial portions of the central plains from grain production has nothing to do with the concept of subsidized grain production. Indeed, one can argue that, with substantially less reserve from which to pull, the result would be increased subsidies to induce more grain growing elsewhere. Meantime, virtually the entire populations of North and South Dakota, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas and most of Missouri and Minnesota would be without an economy to sustain them.
