For 1st time in 4 years, US life expectancy rises

[Roadkingtrax]

But the most efficient way to do that is NOT to prevent mechanized, large scale agriculture, and instead subsidize 40-acre farms that use mules.

It sounds to me like our local liberals are advocating what Kenya and Zimbabwe did -- those nations were net food exporters, and now have to import food. And thanks to their crackpot, left wing economic policies, they can't afford that.

It sounds like alzheimers has become an airborne contagion.

Vern...Trump's administration is issuing aid for votes. To cover up economic hardship brought on by fool hardy tariffs.

[Vern Humphrey]

No I didn't say any thing like that at all...

Once more mixing politics and economics -- and favoring the kind of crackpot ideas that turned so many countries into famine-stricken pockets of starvation.

Ask him if he can explain how favoring 40 acres and a mule benefits the rest of us?

[S.A. Boggs]

But the most efficient way to do that is NOT to prevent mechanized, large scale agriculture, and instead subsidize 40-acre farms that use mules.

It sounds to me like our local liberals are advocating what Kenya and Zimbabwe did -- those nations were net food exporters, and now have to import food. And thanks to their crackpot, left wing economic policies, they can't afford that.

My Amish friends use as modern equipment as possible. One has forgone animals in lieu of diesel tractors and his leaders are O.K. with this.
Sam

[jdmcgrath]

So someone finally went there...blaming small farms for getting in the way of progress. When only large corporate farms remain, who does the actual farming? Who is left to grow up on a farm?

[Vern Humphrey]

My Amish friends use as modern equipment as possible. One has forgone animals in lieu of diesel tractors and his leaders are O.K. with this.
Sam

In a nation of 330 million people, our agriculture has to mechanize or starve.

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So someone finally went there...blaming small farms for getting in the way of progress. When only large corporate farms remain, who does the actual farming? Who is left to grow up on a farm?

Who should decide that? If the small farmer decides to sell out, would you stop him? Perhaps put him in jail?

Would you drive food prices higher and higher, for the benefit of a handful of farmers?

Let me point out that I AM a farmer.

[S.A. Boggs]

As much as possible we grown our own produce and herbs. Tonight I am making potato dumplings with what we have grown. Our Farmers Market is thriving and has grown every year. One farmer brings in Bison from his own herd and it is expensive, yet he usually sells out. The small farmer is thriving in our area as well as a local dairy.
Sam

[Vern Humphrey]

Yes, indeed, we small farmers thrive -- but we can't produce the quantities the large farms produce. We can feed ourselves and some (but not all) of our fellow citizens. Mechanized large-scale agriculture is necessary to avoid world-wide famine.

[jdmcgrath]

Not seeing a real farmer talk about food prices like that. Gentleman hobby farmer maybe, for the fun of it. In farming like anything, such a thing as too big.

[Roadkingtrax]

As much as possible we grown our own produce and herbs. Tonight I am making potato dumplings with what we have grown. Our Farmers Market is thriving and has grown every year. One farmer brings in Bison from his own herd and it is expensive, yet he usually sells out. The small farmer is thriving in our area as well as a local dairy.
Sam

Weather is bad enough...lets add tariffs.

Ohio is suffering. Enjoy your meal?

https://www.toledoblade.com/business/agriculture/2019/08/19/million-ohio-acres-remain-unplanted-in-worst-season-on-record-farmers/stories/20190816141

[Vern Humphrey]

Not seeing a real farmer talk about food prices like that. Gentleman hobby farmer maybe, for the fun of it. In farming like anything, such a thing as too big.

And you don't see General Motors talk about automobile prices being too high, do you?

If you understand the economics of farming, you can do well (but you can't overcome the economies of scale.) We can't feed this country on 40 acres and a mule, let alone feed the rest of the world.

Take a look at the Collectivization Famine and the Great Leap Forward, where Stalin and Mao tried to make agriculture bend to their ideology.

[jdmcgrath]

You don't see it, do you. Your argument against forced collectivization was exactly used to justify a decentralized and private agricultural sector in this country that was more than up to the job of feeding the nation and then some while providing a decent living for farmers and rural towns. The conglomeration you now extoll is the collectivization of the modern age, with hourly workers at low pay replacing the landowners, all so we can sell almonds or soybeans to Asia even as rural schools shut their doors for want of students.

[Sandpebble]

what makes no sense Sam is that we are willing to allow a President and GOP Senators to prevent the use of witnesses or submission of evidence simply because it suits our point of view...

I mentioned it to you before ..... If the "Black Man previous" had told members of the government to with hold evidence or defy a subpoena... you'd be screaming for an impeachment ....

....am I wrong there Sam.... fess up now bro ...soul search and tell the truth

[Sandpebble]

Well....

This seems appropriate.

Well that doesn't seem as bad as accusing some one you hired of trying to publish state secrets and preventing the publication of his book

especially when the accusation of his book mentioning secrets is a lie ...know what I mean ? ... and what about the security leaks perpetrated by Donald himslf ?

[Vern Humphrey]

You don't see it, do you. Your argument against forced collectivization was exactly used to justify a decentralized and private agricultural sector

You don't see it, do you. The argument is not what you think it is. The argument is that ideological, political solutions do not work in agriculture (nor in any other field of economic endeavor.)

If small farms were economically advantageous, we would be a nation of small farms. But the cold hard fact is that economies of scale work in agriculture just like in other fields. We cannot go back to a rosy time of small farms and yeoman farmers (a time that, by the way, never existed).

If you want to see what happens when you try it, look at Kenya and Zimbabwe -- nations that were once net food exporters and now cannot feed themselves.

[jdmcgrath]

The current distortions in the subsidy policy make arguments about optimal farm size impossible to resolve. The only thing known is that larger farms are better positioned to capture generous government subsidies. Knocking 40 acres and a mule also ignores the many contributions made to the country by amazing people who had the benefit of growing up on farms. Fewer of them than ever now as farmsteads empty out.