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Why Are Farm Subsidies Bad

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Farm subsidies ARE horrible. Americans can first do themselves a favor and save money by abolishing farm subsidies and trading with developing nations for lower-cost, higher-quality food. This not only puts tax money back into our hands, but we are then able to buy cheaper food, and at the same time help boost an economy of a developing nation. US farm subsidies DO benefit foreign consumers as they get to eat cheaper food that are subsidized by the American taxpayers. While I am all for free market and abolishing subsidies, people need to be more careful in arguing against farm subsidies. Subsidies are wrong because they are paid out of the (unwilling) taxpayers' pockets. Americans are actually doing the rest of the world a great favor by subsidizing them to eat our food. …show more content…

So Coburn would hurt US agriculture. He favors foreign aegis buyers over farmers in his own state. He apparently talks to the minority of farmers who are Republican ideologues, who don't know that a farm markets "lack price responsiveness" (they don't self-correct in free markets) on both the supply (farmer) and demand (consumer) sides. (Cf. Daryll E. Ray, "Are the five oft-cited reasons for farm programs actually symptoms of a more basic reason") So it's the free market that hurts global farmers, but that was fixed by New Deal minimum prices, (which congress reduced, 1953-1995, and eliminated, 1996-2018), not subsidies. Subsidies were drastically reduced in the 2014 farm bill, but the free market continues to fail, & that's projected through 2026 by

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