It’s a very tangled web. If I were to summarize in one word, it is due to Subsidies.
Pensions and social security and international trade and Wall Street and subsidies are all tied together. It’s an infuriatingly tight ball of yarn.
If I have to be uncharitable, I would say that American macro economics is a Ponzi scheme. But..on the other hand..this is also why food is so cheap in the USA. As a country, we run on credit. This too gives an illusion of prosperity. Just think about it. How can you get 6 chicken nuggets do for $1.00 from Mickey D? Because. America. And that’s because of that ball of yarn. Try taking away the Happy Meal’esque comfort from Americans and there will be a (weak)revolution. It makes me surmise that this what America wants. Is that a good or a bad thing? Does it matter if I or anyone else have an opinion?
Here is what I am sure of and what troubles me:
1. You can’t ‘make’ land anymore. It’s a fixed asset and resource(water rights, mineral rights).
2. Land rights and resources are not renewable.
3. Land owning farmers have become poorer and poorer over the years..saddled by debt due to ..well..farming. Mostly in credit.
4. This is due to subsidies, credit to buy everything from expensive tractors, inputs, fertiiisers, seed etc.
5. Increase in population means more have to be grown in a smaller foot print of cultivable land.
6. Pressure to grow more. In farming, the more successful you are, you lose. Because of glut and law of economics(demand/supply/price). 7. Farmers are set up for failure. Value is derived from scarcity. When farmers are more productive, their margins shrink. I don’t know any other sector where this is true.
8. The credit lines and loans and debt is real tho’.
9. This will separate farmers from their land.
10. Money and financial instruments are man made constructs. Which means they are replicable. Land is fixed and can’t be created. When one is traded for another and the terms are written by one party, it’s is essentially a land grab.
11. This is why our dairy industry is almost gone. We rely on imports for food. Most mid west farming is corn and soy which is feed, fuel and fodder. Tyson exports to China. Smithfield is owned by China as are many livestock farms in az and Iowa.
12. Middle Eastwrn countries and China own acres and acres of farm land. And many more we don’t know through shell companies. This is rather common.
13. True for other places as well. Fonterra.. NZ’d dairy Co-op sold a portion to China and its milk powder division sells to China directly. China ships water from Australia and NZ. Canadian pension funds has invested in Australian dairy and cattle farms. I am not sure this is a good idea.
14. China has chronic food shortages and has to import to feed its 1.3 billion people.
15. Contrast this to India where they export excess in grains, spices, pulses etc with equivalent population and shrinking farmland. Main reason is the protection of farmland. Foreigners or foreign passport holders even if born in India can’t own farmland. (Unless they inherit farmland).
Food self sufficiency is very important. The first step to achieving it is to divorce food from speculation channels and interests. Protect farmland and water resources. This is something that has to be done globally and not just USA.
Edited to add: here is one more puzzle. American farmers growing corn and soy get subsidies to grow cheap food. But this is mostly for export. So in a way,...considering subsidies are funded by tax payer monies...aren’t we all paying taxes to subsidize exports? We are subsidizing American exports of cheap grain and not American farmers. The lion’s share of American farmers expenses(because what they make is so little compared to what they spend) goes to John Deere and Monsanto and seed companies and Syngenta et al. all publicly listed and traded companies. In a way American Ag IS Wall Street when you untangle this. But do we really want to do that? Do we really want to know where this leads?