Word: honestus
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...Honestus: U.S. farm programs produce a rich crop of ironies. The price-support system was started during the Great Depression to keep farmers from going bankrupt. Yet in actual operation, it helps the poorest farmers least; the really hefty price-support payments go to the big operators. A notable recipient of price-support payments in recent years has been the Delta & Pine Land Co., a sprawling Mississippi firm largely owned by British interests; it's been getting more than a million dollars a year in price-support loans on cotton. Another irony is that, while supposedly helping to preserve...
...Honestus:No, large segments of U.S. agriculture-meat, poultry, fruits, most vegetables-get along all right without price supports or controls. Secretary Freeman wants to extend production controls to some of these still free products, but so far Congress has fought him off. The main supported crops are wheat, feed grains (corn, oats, grain sorghums, barley-so called because they are grown mainly for livestock feed), cotton, tobacco and dairy products. Price supports are also in effect for some relatively minor crops, including rice and peanuts...
...Honestus: Well, it's seldom said that bluntly-even though it's so. Actually, there are two separate farm problems, which require separate solutions, and some of the confusion about farm policy arises from failure to distinguish between them. There is the problem of marginal farmers, most of them in the South, who barely scratch a living from the soil; their difficulty is not overproduction but underproduction. The marginal farmer lacks the capital, land, energy, initiative, skill, or whatever else is required to earn a U.S.-style livelihood in agriculture in competition with commercial farmers. The other problem...
...Honestus: Benson's failure to make any progress in that direction was discouraging. But there are some hopeful signs. The Kennedy Administration at least recognizes that the cost of present farm programs is intolerably high. And the House did reject the more-controls approach. The Farm Bureau's advocacy of lower support prices suggests that many farmers are disgusted with the present system of high supports and entangling controls (with 1,600,000 members, the bureau is the biggest of U.S. farmer organizations). And it is at least possible that the non-farmers of the nation will some...
Confusa: Well, Honestus, you can count me among the indignant ones right...