« BACK  |  PRINT

RS

MEMBER DIARY

Democrat Chairman Pushes Cow Killing to Raise Milk Prices

Tragic: It Might Not End Up in the Stimulus Bill

By: Brian Faughnan (Diary)  |  January 21st, 2009 at 03:37 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Opponents of excess government meddling in the private market often argue that it puts government policymakers in an inherently unfair position: that of picking winners and losers. House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson gives us an excellent example: he’s working to raise milk prices, leaving dairy farmers the winners while everyone who consumers dairy products winds up losing. Also winning: steak lovers, who will see lots more beef on the market. Also losing: the cows.

A stimulus package may be a lifeline for the nation’s economy, but it could be a death sentence for a lot of cows.

Lawmakers are looking for ways to use the forthcoming stimulus bill to help dairy farmers, and the number one priority is to dampen milk supplies and prop up prices. Translation: reduce the nation’s dairy herd…

Taking milk cows out of production as a way to control milk prices is a controversial approach. The federal government tried that in the 1980s through the whole herd buyout program, and while the policy worked for a time, milk production eventually bounced back and farmers were once again grappling with low milk prices…

The National Milk Producers Federation, representing bargaining cooperatives for dairy farmers, already has a herd retirement program that is not publicly funded. The so-called Cooperatives Working Together program has paid farmers since 2003 to retire cows. In 2007, the program helped take 52,783 cows out of production.

Mr. Peterson said he asked the NMPF if it could use stimulus money to speed up the CWT program.

So far the answer is no; Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey has given the cows a reprieve (for now anyway). But you can bet that advocates of a cowacaust will keep trying. After all, it’s just the sort of thing that makes sense for a stimulus package. Because if increasing the price of every gallon of milk, every pint of ice cream, every slice of cheese, and every stick of butter in the country isn’t a great way to get the economy moving again… well, you might as well not have a Congress at all.

Tags: , , , ,

COMMENTS

POSTING RULES  |  LOGIN TO COMMENT  |  REGISTER TODAY
  • kat

    Higher milk prices (based on market pricing) for dairy farmers are definitely needed. The government regulates how much farmers can make for their milk, but allows prices on the shelves to go unregulated. Higher prices at the market very rarely mean your local dairy farmer is getting paid more for that milk. There is no correlation between the two prices.

    If faced with doing a job in 2009 that earned me less in actual dollars, not adjusted dollars, than what I was being paid in the 1970s, I would say goodbye to the farm. Unfortunately for our country, too many of our family farms have done just that. Until our nation faces deaths due to drinking melamine tainted milk imported from China will anyone even start to question why we aren’t producing it ourselves.

    The milk pricing regulations need to be changed, not less milk produced here in the US. We need to keep making this here in the US while providing our farmers with the market based pricing they deserve. Support your local farmers, they provide us the safe food and drink we and our children need.

    • From ME to You

      is another “socialist” idea! Until you start seeing a farm for what it truly is, a business, you will not be able to formulate a good policy.

      The correct policy would be to eliminate price controls and let the efficient farms prosper and the inefficient farms go by the wayside. In this way market forces would dictate the price of the product not some overpaid bureaucrat. The price of milk is actually higher now than it would be if the government would get out of price fixing and the dairy farmer doesn’t get the money!

      Price controls reward inefficiency just like bailouts!

      • JustLeaveMeAlone

        I go out of my way NOT to participate in Stupid USDA Programs Run By Moronic Bureaucrats (TM). I figure we have choices about what crops to raise (or what livestock — which we gave up years ago). If we make the wrong choice, we’re like any other business — subject to the law of supply and demand like any other business.

        But the USDA is relentless in trying to “help”. Another reason to avoid their help as it isn’t free; there are serious strings attached, and when I’m on MY dang land that my family has owned free and clear for five generations, I want as few people as possible telling me what I must do.

        Now, to be fair, we do not rely on the family farm to support us. We formed an LLC to own the farm; someone else does our farming; from time to time we have timber cut; we rent out the houses and the country store on the property. At the end of the day, we make enough to pay the taxes. That’s about all. Some years, we get enough to buy an extra Christmas present or two. Some years we lose money.

        Why keep it? It’s insurance — a bolt-hole should life become more difficult. It basically costs us nothing to own; and if worse comes to worst, we could always kick out a tenant, move into the old farmhouse, stock the old chickencoop with some laying hens, fire up the old smokehouse, put in a garden, hunt in the woods, and chop wood for the fireplaces. At least we wouldn’t starve.

        Of course, there’s probably some USDA regulation against actually being responsible and self sufficient.

        • From ME to You

          Not so smart people….!

          A good example is the Maine potato farmers in “the County” up north.

          Many of them were family farms and did quite well selling potatoes (Dan Quayle was right! spell checker said ‘potatoes’ is OK!) when there was a market for them here in the Northeast and there was a demand for potato starch.

          When transportation enabled potatoes from that other place (Idaho) started to be economically available the demand for the smaller white potato dropped. Instead of looking for a more marketable variety many continued planting the same thing until they went broke. The successful farmers changed with the times and found new products to sell.

          Here is a link to one of them:

        • Achance

          of land that has been in my family since the Georgia Creek Cession Lottery in 1795. I have a small commercial building on it that more or less pays for itself and helps with the taxes. Other than that, it is fee simple property in a warm place that I could live and grow food on if it came to that. As long as I could see it coming in time to safely get there anyway.

        • zuiko

          They are hard to avoid too… I always get these threatening surveys in the mail from them that I must fill out under penalty of law with a bunch of questions on them about what I do with my farm. It’s none of their business so they aren’t going to get a response.

          • janis

            stick to farm type questions, but I’d really like to know why it’s important to them to know how many people live on my land, how many rooms are in my house and lots of other stuff that’s just none of their business. Sent it back to them–after they sent it the third time– with big letters across the front saying, “WE JUST LIVE HERE. WE NO LONGER FARM. LEAVE US ALONE.”

            Can’t wait for the 2010 Census. I filled in the Ethnic section with “Klingon” and put “Druid Priestess” under occupation in 2000.

      • kat

        On both sides of my family, this isn’t about “hanging on to the family farm”. I don’t personally farm, but still have family members that do. They don’t do it because of the socialist ideal, they do it for love of the work. If you don’t love it, you can’t do it – there aren’t many rewards when you farm. It literally is a 24/7 job. And the farmers I know understand it is a business. They are businessmen that do what they can under the thumb of the government.

        Every farmer I know wants the government out of the price control business. They WANT market rates for their products.

        • zuiko

          Not to lower them. They don’t want government out of the business. What they really want is ratcheted up intervention for their benefit. The free market solution to low prices that you are too inefficient to profit from is to either expand or get out. Most farmers prefer the 3rd way… which is handouts from the government. You really think all the agriwelfare we hand out at the expensive of taxpayers and consumers is over the objections of farmers?

          • kat

            They want no agriwelfare, just fair prices for their milk. The government is intervening and increasing prices AT THE STORE. As the price at the store has increased, the milk prices for the farmer have steadily decreased. Early in Bush’s presidency, milk was nearly $20/cwt, now it is $12. Increase in price to farmers? I think not.

          • zuiko

            Nobody talks about wanting a fat government check, but thousands of farmers sure have no problem depositing them in their checking accounts. And do anything to interfere with their government gravy train and there will be heck to pay. I got neighbors who are collecting 6 and 7 figures from the government every year. Many more that are collecting smaller amounts. I’m sure they want to keep the government out of their business too… so long as the checks keep coming.

            There is no right to high prices for the goods you produce. If milk producers don’t like the price of milk, they just need to get out of the business. That’s how business works. You don’t run to the government and complain that you aren’t getting enough for your product. If they can’t find another, more productive use for their assets, I’m sure they’ll have no problem selling their assets to more efficient operations that can.

    • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens
    • Praying

      After costing around $2.50/gal (store brand, skim milk) for several years, milk shot up to over $4,00/gal (over $5.00/gal for brand name). It’s FINALLY back down to usually $3.50/gal (store brand, skim milk). I have two teenage calves – er – boys – who consume LOTS of milk. We joked over the summer if the gas bill or the milk bill (no, I buy my milk at the grocery store like everyone else, I’m just saying it this way for effect. Although when I was growing up, we did have a “milkman” who delivered our milk two times a week, so my parents really did get a milk bill) would be higher each month. Anyway, I agree the farmers need to get more for their gallons of milk, but I’m not sure how much more the consumer can afford to pay for a gallon of milk!

      • kat

        The farmers are not getting the increase. The price for milk right now (thanks to government regulation) is lower than it was in the mid ’70s. Think about any business today, one that is heavily reliant on energy (diesel for tractors, electricity for the barn & milkhouse), getting less for their product than they did 30 years ago and yet having costs that have skyrocketed. Farmers are getting about $12/cwt (about 100 pounds of milk).

        Personally, I want no government regulation when it comes to the price of milk. The rules of supply and demand SHOULD rule, but the government makes sure it doesn’t.

        • Praying

          but I completely missed making that point. The farmers need to get more for their milk, without driving up the cost to the consumer. You said it better.

        • zuiko

          They need to get out of the business and let the people who CAN make a profit do it. Most farmers are doing just fine. And the ones that aren’t? I can’t say I really feel bad for someone sitting on millions of dollars in capital, who decided to use all that capital towards doing something that they can’t manage a profit on.

          • kat

            They would do as normal capitalism based businesses do. Increase or decrease production as the market requires. The only answer for today’s small farmer is to try to make more milk, but that requires more help, more diesel fuel, etc., so it doesn’t balance out for them.

            Zuiko, when you start having to drink milk from China that may or may not be contaminated, maybe you will start to question why we just can’t make it here. I for one, will enjoy the fresh milk I get from my family’s farm, as well as the fruits and veggies fresh from their land.

          • zuiko

            They would do as normal capitalism based businesses do. Increase or decrease production as the market requires.

            OK

            The only answer for today?s small farmer is to try to make more milk

            So there is someone with a gun to their head saying they have to stay in the dairy business if the economics aren’t working for them? The only thing they can do is increase production?

            that requires more help, more diesel fuel, etc., so it doesn?t balance out for them.

            Expanding your business generally means laying out more capital and adding to your overhead. That is a fact of life. It is not limited to farms.

            Government getting out of agriculture would mean lower prices for all agricultural commodities, and probably less production in the United States. That isn’t going to help the small inefficient producer do anything but go out of business. When you are complaining about “unfair” prices for agricultural commodities, you are asking for more government intervention, not less.

            . I for one, will enjoy the fresh milk I get from my family?s farm, as well as the fruits and veggies fresh from their land.

            You are free to enjoy your fresh milk and veggies, just don’t ask me to pay for it.

    • zuiko

      Low prices are generally considered a good thing when we are talking about any other commodity other than food. Not so with agriculture. With agriculture we need to subsidize the production, support the prices, flood foreign markets with free food (that the taxpayers paid for) that only hurts local farmers, and give farmers an exemption from anti-trust law so they can collude to fix production amounts. Why, exactly is this the case with corn and not oil, steel, or any other product? Maybe because it buys votes in rural areas?

      • skorrent1

        Duh! Ya think?

  • 10ksnooker

    They each ask the other guy to cutback, yet they all have bills to pay. The lower goes the price the more you gotta pump.

    Works for near everything, isn’t a top down economy planning government grand …

  • zsmvf6
  • Darin_H

    This isn’t the comment you’re looking for

    • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens
  • rick554

    In 1975 or’76, the peanut farmer Carter did the same thing. The gov’t bought up entire dairy herds, some of which were the finest milking cattle you ever saw.Whole counties were suddenly out of work. Farmers went on welfare, the kids moved into the cities. Absolultly nothing good came of this. Our farm, which had been in the family for over 150 years was land-taxed out of existence and nobody lives on the land anymore. And all this so factory farms , headquartered in NYC, Saudi Arabia and England could raise prices. Watch out boys , its coming again. How sad. But hey, Barry is the Hopey- Changey guy so he knows it all. Disgusting to see such a profane idea resurfacing again

  • kat

    Have all been sold to land developers. My father’s cousins finally were the generation that sold out. They received millions for the farms. Not that I blame them, the money is tempting after the years of hard work and little financial reward.

    Some of my relatives here in PA still have family farms and I hope to see them keep the farms. The money they have received for natural gas exploration (think Marcellus shale) is what is tiding them over during this rough patch. Unless gas is found, that cash will only last so long. Let’s hope this hopey-changey thing only lasts 4 years.

  • rick554

    Obviously , it had to either 1977 or 1978. Get the USDA outta farming and let farmers FARM!

  • WSG

    To Zulko and From Me to Thee, et al… .
    The Feds( mostly the Dems) have been meddling in production agriculture now for more than seven decades and what you see today is history not the outcome of rational free market influences.
    The intention of FDR, et al was NEVER to save the “small farms.” Price supports can buy votes in the short term but long term by encouraging over production -”price supports” cause farm gate prices to decline.
    In the early 1930′s 30-33% of household disposable income was spent on food and no where near that percentage on taxes. The New Deal was about growing government and the Left’s power – period. In the late summer of 1945 corn was $2.45 per bushel and until this most recent “oil bubble” in commodity prices corn had generally traded plus or minus one dollar of that ! Check the date – that is more than sixty years…. . I don’t think yours or most folks income has stayed that flat has it ?
    Today the average household spends 6-11% of disposable income on food and about 35- 50% on TAXES (government). Get the picture ??
    Since 1980 well over 90 % of the dairy farms are out of business.
    Ours was one of that statistic. Dad and I could not out work the weather, out smart the Feds and decades of entrenched market stupidity and earn even a modest living. The ever increasing cost of inputs, normal business risks and regulatory insanity were never offset by increasing profits. There isn’t a pencil sharp enough for that budget.
    THE ONLY WAY to survive was to gain economies of scale – GET HUGE or get out. Most got out.
    Production agriculture – despite what many of you urban types think NEVER was Green Acres. Nor is ag. or real life a Disney movie.
    There is NO Constitutional guarantee of “cheap food.”
    Most of the families who still farm full time are VERY- VERY Sharp business types and work – I mean real long, dirty and tough work – NOT parked behind a desk . And no even the illegals don’t want to be on the business end of a 1000 – 60 lb. bales of alfalfa on a 90 degree July afternoon between the am and pm milking.

    Lastly, Mr Faughnan – the “cowocaust” term demeans the death of millions of humans at the hands of fascists. Bovines have roamed the planet for ions so a few thousand more or less in the service of humanity.. ?? – There is ZERO MORAL EQUIVALENCE. Words have meaning please- please sir – choose wisely.

    • zuiko

      The market left to it’s own devices will do the same thing for “small farms” (whatever that means nowadays…not the same as it meant 50 or 100 years ago, that is for sure) that Wal-Mart did for “corner grocery stores.” The efficient producers will prosper. The inefficient producers will fail. The government has been meddling (without any success) for the better part of a century to try to change that fact.

    • DONTREADONME

      So little atoms with a missing an electron roamed the planet for few thousand years more than in the service of humanity. I think ions were here since the ignition of the universe, it is called plasma check the sun for some more.

      Maybe you should lighten up and choose your words wisely!

    • zuiko

      I have to say I have about as much sympathy for farmers who don’t think they are getting a “fair” price for their product as I do for these guys who don’t think they are getting a “fair” price for their product, either. The price of their product is about 1/5th the price it was 6 months ago… heck it is a quarter of what it was in back in the 1860s.

  • smagar

    A friend of mine attended a briefing at the US Embassy (then in Bonn) back in the 1990s. There he heard this story:

    When Germany reunified, a West German dairy firm bought East Germany’s biggest dairy. German officials eagerly awaited the creation of a new company that could employ lots of former East Germans and help unify the reborn country’s economy.

    Nein!

    The West Germans killed the East German cows, and then raised the price of their milk products.

    Adam Smith, meet Machiavelli.

  • wolfgang

    During FDR’s heyday, ther New Deal brought the Schechter Brothers, immigrant Kosher butchers from Brooklyn, to trial for of all things, allowing the customer to select the chickens they wanted butchered.