Whose Subsidy Is It Anyway?

Farmers take the heat, but Big Ag reaps the farm bill benefits

By David Moberg

The farm bill, which Congress will likely vote on this fall, will affect environmental, consumer, industrial, trade and anti-poverty policies as well as the prices and subsidies farmers receive for producing commodity crops such as corn, wheat and soybeans. Legislators are now conducting hearings and [RETURN TO ARTICLE]

  • Reader Comments

    Good article, I thought.  That the Bush administration seems to want to return to the philosophy of the disastrous “Freedom to Farm Act” says a lot about their general lack of judgement and their inability to learn from experience.

    Overall, a good use of the chicken industry as an example, but I think that the interest of major chicken players in low grain prices is somewhat overstated.  Because there are so few major players, and because they do not sell “chickens on the hoof”, higher grain prices are very easily passed on to the consumer,  leaving their profits untouched.  It seems to me that the consumer bears the brunt of higher grain prices, in a myriad of food products.  So saying that the farm subsidies go instead to corporate players would be also overstated.  Still, current farm subsidies that are almost totally divorced from production limits or need do contribute to lower grain market prices.

    Posted by JPetersmith on Jun 4, 2007 at 1:04 PM