Professors Don Boudreaux (George Mason University), Susan Dudley (George Washington University) & Bradley Schiller (University of Nevada-Reno) discuss the causes & solutions to Cronyism in America.

Now all you need to do is convince all the sides, Conservatives, Moderates and Liberals to take the plunge Good luck They will all offer nails to your executioner AC.

"Mark Malloch Brown, former head of the United Nations Development Program, estimated that farm subsidies cost poor countries about USD$50 billion a year in lost agricultural exports:

"It is the extraordinary distortion of global trade, where the West spends $360 billion a year on protecting its agriculture with a network of subsidies and tariffs that costs developing countries about US$50 billion in potential lost agricultural exports. Fifty billion dollars is the equivalent of today's level of development assistance." -Wilkipedia

Here's an interesting give and take between opposite views on subsidies to farmers.
http://www.freetrade.org/node/618

Bob Young

April 23, 2007

Bob Young

I thought I'd give my reasons for farm programs before we get into the point/counterpoint that will unfold later this week. There are at least three reasons one can develop to justify farm programs.

First, it is difficult to imagine a world where governments will not be involved in something as basic as the nation's food supply. Rich countries do it by providing direct financial support to their producers. Poor countries tend to do it by providing high tariff protections. As a consumer, do you want the government to make sure we have a bushel too much or a bushel too little? That's a dumb question. So if we want to make sure there is a bushel too much, the inelastic nature of food markets will make prices be lower than they otherwise would be. It is an insurance policy. Pay the premium.

Second, as a society, we want to ensure our soil resource is just as productive twenty, fifty, even one hundred years from now as it is today. Farmers are far and away some of the best day in, day out environmental stewards in the country. But the production practices they need to undertake to protect that soil resource will require them to be less than profit maximizing, at least in the short run. It is an investment in society's long-run benefit. Make it.

Third, it would be one thing if it were farmer competing against farmer in international markets, but that's clearly not the case. Agricultural markets in the United States tend to be fairly open. The average tariff faced by countries trying to land agricultural products here is around 12 percent. The average tariff faced by our farmers is around 62 percent. Our farmers work in a very different regulatory environment than exists in several other countries, and as consumers we're glad of it. It is compensation to help level the playing field. We provide protection to other sectors of the economy when they face unfair competition. Why should agriculture be any different?

Agriculture in the United States over the last fifty years has been an amazing success story. We have provided critical input for society as a whole at an almost continuously decreasing real cost. We are making better use of inputs today than at any time in the past and are almost constantly improving our environmental footprint. Now we are being looked at to provide the feedstock for renewable fuels, a task that will require substantial investments on the part of producers. They will respond.

We have a lot to talk about this week. Let the games begin.


Daniel T. Griswold

April 20, 2007

Daniel T. Griswold

America's farm programs are relics of a bygone era, a drag on our twenty-first century economy, and a blemish on America's image in the world. Subsidies and tariffs enacted in the 1930s as temporary "emergency" measures remain largely intact today, despite the profound changes in our economy and world.

According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), America's farm programs transfer about $40 billion a year from consumers, firms, and taxpayers to a small group of farmers. Tariffs and quotas on imported sugar, rice, and dairy products force American families to pay about $10 billion a year above what they would pay at world prices. This tax hits poor families especially hard because they spend a higher share of their budget on food. Artificially high prices also punish food-processing industries, forcing confectioners and others to relocate abroad.

Farm support programs cost taxpayers nearly $20 billion a year, real money even in Washington. Ninety percent of those subsidies go to producers of only five program crops--corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, and rice. According to the Environmental Working Group, the top 10 percent of recipients collected two-thirds of subsidies.

That money is not supporting poor, struggling "family farmers." Average household income for family farms is now 10 percent above the average income for non-farm households. During 2004-2006, net farm income averaged a record $72.7 billion annually. Meanwhile, the net worth of U.S. farmers grew $90 billion a year during that same time and farm equity has now reached $1.6 trillion. The debt-to-asset ratio for U.S. farmers is the lowest in forty-five years.

While farm programs have enriched certain farmers, they have failed to deliver long-promised "rural development." Commodity supports actually reduce economic diversity and dynamism in rural communities. A study by the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank found that counties that received the most farm payments per capita suffered subpar population and employment growth.

Farm supports damage the environment by promoting overuse of fertilizers and pesticides. Inflated land prices crowd out conservation, reforestation and other alternative uses. Domestic supports also depress global prices, hurting poor people abroad and complicating efforts to open markets for U.S. exporters.

There is nothing inherent to farming that makes it worthy of such largesse. Farming would thrive without farm programs. America's abundant and fertile land and technology guarantee we will continue to be a competitive food producer. Two-thirds of American farmers currently produce for the market without government support.

This on-line debate is hosted by the Council on Foreign Relations.

Jeffrey Sachs: 'That's not a free market, that's a game'

The controversial economist talks about the collapse of the global financial system and how to end the crisis.

Talk to Al Jazeera Last Modified: 11 Dec 2011 07:42


With the financial markets still in turmoil and banks, currencies, even countries struggling to return to normal, the free market is in trouble.

Viable options are scarce, sparking global protests against the rich 1%.

Jeffrey Sachs, an academic 'superstar' known for his controversial work on shock therapy, a theory that was applied and tested in dramatic fashion with the privatisation of state resources in South America and Russia.

How can the global financial crisis be solved? What went wrong, and what are the stakes? One of the most controversial economists of our time talks to Al Jazeera's Sami Zeidan about the debt crisis, what caused it and how to fix it.

"The banks have said, leave us deregulated, we know how to run things, don't put government in to meddle. Then with that freedom of maneuver they took huge gambles, and even made illegal actions, and then broke the world system. As soon as that happened then they rushed out to say 'bail us out, bail us out, if you don't bail us out, we're too big to fail, you have to save us'. As soon as that happened, they said 'oh, don't regulate us, we know what to do'. And they almost went back to their old story, and the public is standing there, amazed, because we just bailed you out how can you be paying yourself billions of dollars of bonuses again? And the bankers say, 'well we deserve it, what's your problem'? And the problem that the Occupy Wall Street and other protesters have is: you don't deserve it, you nearly broke the system, you gamed the economy, you're paying mega fines, yet you're still in the White House you're going to the state dinners, you're paying yourself huge bonuses, what kind of system is this?

When I talk about this in the United States, I'm often attacked, 'oh, you don't believe in the free market economy', I say, how much free market can there be? You say deregulate, the moment the banks get in trouble, you say bail them out, the moment you bail them out, you say go back to deregulation.

That's not a free market, that's a game, and we have to get out of the game. We have to get back to grown-up behaviour."

Jeffrey Sachs, Columbia University

When I talk about this in the United States, I'm often attacked, 'oh, you don't believe in the free market economy', I say, how much free market can there be? You say deregulate, the moment the banks get in trouble, you say bail them out, the moment you bail them out, you say go back to deregulation.

That's not a free market, that's a game, and we have to get out of the game. We have to get back to grown-up behaviour."

Jeffrey Sachs, Columbia University

We must allow poor business models to fail. It is the only way to weed out weaknesses in the system, to do otherwise is to perpetuate inefficiency. After all is this not part of what "Capitalism" is all about? If we do the contrary it will resemble socialist or communist economies where poor services and products are allowed to flourish in spite of its lacking in quality.

Apparently Jeffery Sachs friends do not know what is a "free Market"

You need to read it again sam, I mean tony............