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Posted on 10/26/2007 9:44:36 AM PDT by BGHater
Proposal helps the poor who receive food stamps
WASHINGTON -- Farmers and the poor are uneasy partners in the $286 billion farm bill approved Thursday by a Senate committee.
The farmers get subsidies and new payments. The poor, including some 2 million California residents receiving food stamps, get somewhat easier access to benefits.
"It makes a difference between a family going hungry, or not," said Ana Pagan, director of the Merced County Human Services Agency.
But the Senate's farm bill, spanning some 1,300 pages, also reflects competition between its agricultural and its social welfare priorities. The bill's nutrition and rural development sections total 275 pages. The crop subsidy section totals 278 pages.
The trade-offs matter in such places as the San Joaquin Valley, where pov- erty and unemployment force reliance on federal programs funded through the farm bill. The programs will be changing a bit.
The Senate bill, for instance, in- creases the deductions families use when determining food stamp eli- gibility. It allows low-income families to save more and still remain eligible. It doubles from three months to six the length of time an unemployed person can receive food stamps during a three-year period.
"What we're dealing with, quite often, is a working family that has two or three jobs, and that still can't make it," Pagan said. "With the food stamps, they get a little big of an edge."
Lydia Gutierrez, director of the Fresno family resource center for Catholic Charities, said the available federal food benefits "are never adequate." Catholic Charities helps distribute farm-bill-authorized food packages.
(Excerpt) Read more at modbee.com ...
Meanwhile, the bulk of us pay prices determined by the market...whatever that is in a subsidized world.
is amnesty part of this?
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They are adding even more social spending on an agriculture bill. The social spending is getting into everything. Last I saw, they were still trying to slip some into the military spending bills.
I heard There are also provisions in the bill making migrant “guest workers” more easily available for agriculture employers.
In other words. Peacemeal Dream Act implementation.
Nah, no illegals get food stamps do they?
GUT, director of the Fresno family resource center for Catholic Charities, said the available federal food benefits “are never adequate.”
Never happen, not with a "compassionate" president and big agriculture's donations to the party.
From the article:
Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, the farm bill costs about $286 billion over five years. Nutrition programs account for more than two-thirds of the total.
Traditional crop subsidies, by contrast, claim about 12 percent of the bill’s spending.
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More than 2/3 of the funding is for nutrition programs (re: foodstamps etc.)
Probably not the Dream Act but the AgJobs amnesty.
I’m at a loss to figure out what “poor farmers” need this money. They’re all big corporations as far as I can tell and they live in some awfully big fancy houses.
I don’t know what part of rural America you have visited recently. But that is NOT the case around Missouri.
The mega operations seem to get the attention. But quite frankly, most farmers would not make it too well without some fresh beef and pork in the freezer and a garden plot.
After taxes, property taxes, equipment and operating costs, and interest from borrowing to put out a crop every year (forgot crop insurance), times are not so great in agriculture for the average farmer.
The farm bill would be much better if the food stamps were left out and put into social services where it belongs.
Giving away food only keeps the value and prices low for the producers. And packaging costs, transportation costs have added on to what food costs. A very small percentage of the cost of a steak actually goes back to the farmer.
Two forms of socialism in one bill. Great.
The poor, including some 2 million California residents receiving food stamps, get somewhat easier access to benefits.
And I'll bet you can guess who the majority of these 2 million poor residents are.
286 Billion
Could we do with a little less?
....for who those large farm conglomerate corporation?
A large percentage of the Dairy Farms have gone out of business in Missouri because of government regulations more than ofsetting any subsidy they might have recieved.
My x brother in law had a large dairy farm that they folded in favor of just raising cattle. Some of the regulations for dairy operations are so absurd I really didn’t blame him for selling off the dairy cattle.
They recieved pennies on the gallon for the raw milk they sold to the whosale tank truck that picked up their raw milk every day.
Pennies on the gallon, compared to over $4.00 a gallon is highway robbery because the dairy farmer takes all the risk. pays all the costs uf feeding their cattle year round. Pays for the veterinary bills for the care and innoculation of the dairy cattle. Does all the work. Takes all risk. Rewarded the smallest percentage of the pie.
Thats modern day agriculture. subsidies are so strings attached, in most cases, the small farmer cannot accept the money because the cost to comply with the stipulations attached to the subsidy cost more than it is worth.
Now the huge corporate operations have the cash flow to make use of the subsidy to their advantage. They can write off everything and still proifit. The small operation can usually find more write offs on taxes than profits. And as we all know, working for nothing gets us nowhere fast. if it wasn’t for being so land poor, most family farms would not have “ground” to stand on in a business sense.
The only thing farmers are making any profits on is selling corn to ethanol production. For all the bad years where corn sold under $2.00 a bushel, some profitable years might help them catch up to the income levels average Americans have been seeing for years.
The governments position is that they want to keep food cheap. Then they can give food away to the poor and unfortunate around the world.
Cheap food does two things. It buys friends. And it keeps people from complaining. When people are hungry they tend to complain and get more reactive by attempting to become self sufficient.
Self sufficiency is not what our government desires. They want everyone to become dependent on them for their well being. They want to create subjects who will do their bidding. Hungry people tend to revolt against authority. Feed the masses with cheap food or free food and they will be pacified.
If food prices were allowed to reach the adjusted levels of sale price and profit compared to other consumer products, people would scream bloody murder at how much food costs. The scheme is to keep food costs low by subsidizing non production. Then giving food away to subsidize the poor. The plot thickens.
Thank you. That was very informative. It’s a total mess.
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