8 replies to this topic

[diogenes227]

Farmers’ Frustration With Trump Grows as U.S. Escalates China Fight

 

From the link:

 

 

WASHINGTON — Peppered with complaints from farmers fed up with President Trump’s trade war, Sonny Perdue found his patience wearing thin. Mr. Perdue, the agriculture secretary and the guest of honor at the annual Farmfest gathering in southern Minnesota this month, tried to break the ice with a joke.

 

“What do you call two farmers in a basement?” Mr. Perdue asked near the end of a testy hourlong town-hall-style event. “A whine cellar.”

 

A cascade of boos ricocheted around the room.

American farmers have become collateral damage in a trade war that Mr. Trump began to help manufacturers and other companies that he believes have been hurt by China’s “unfair” trade practices.

 

More than a year into the trade dispute, sales of American soybeans, pork, wheat and other agricultural products to China have dried up as Beijing retaliates against Mr. Trump’s tariffs on Chinese imports. Lucrative contracts that farmers long relied on for a significant source of income have evaporated, with Chinese buyers looking to other nations like Brazil and Canada to get the commodities they need. Farm bankruptcy filings in the year through June were up 13 percent from 2018 and loan delinquency rates are on the rise, according to the American Farm Bureau.

 

I wonder where do farmers go to get their $28 billion in taxpayer bailouts (mostly from the Blue States) - the local government welfare office?

[diogenes227]

[MaryAM]

Al administrations have provided farm subsidies.  Nothing new here.  

[bigtrader]

Yup no news here. Farmers have been subsidized for decades

[colion]

Mother Jones is not buying into the New York Times article Farmers’ Frustration With Trump Grows as U.S. Escalates China Fight

 

https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2019/08/china-is-buying-lots-of-us-soybeans/

 

 

China Is Buying Lots of US Soybeans

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  KEVIN DRUM Political BloggerBio | Follow

 

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The New York Times reports a familiar story:

 

"More than a year into the trade dispute, sales of American soybeans, pork, wheat and other agricultural products to China have dried up as Beijing retaliates against Mr. Trump’s tariffs on Chinese imports."

 

I was curious about the latest data on soybeans, so I hopped over to the USDA to look it up. I expected to see the usual data showing soybean shipments to China falling off a cliff, but instead I got a surprise:

 

Soybean shipments did fall off a cliff in 2018, but in 2019 they staged a surprising recovery. If anything, soybean exports to China this year are running a little ahead of their 2017 rate.

Some of this could be due to game playing by the Chinese government, which buys soybeans itself and then resells them to private companies, thus circumventing its own tariffs. Whatever the reason, the actual volume of shipments is now back to normal, or nearly so. However, the price of soybeans, which had been fairly stable since 2016, has declined since the Chinese tariffs took effect, dropping from about $9 per bushel to $8 per bushel. So farmers have definitely taken a hit, but to say that shipments have “dried up” really isn’t right.¹

 

The story on wheat is a little different:

Wheat shipments really did dry up, but they never amounted to much in the first place. At the same time, both US production of wheat and total US exports of wheat were up in 2018 and 2019, and prices have been steady. Chinese tariffs don’t appear to have had any effect at all on US wheat farmers.

Finally, here’s the USDA’s projection of total agricultural exports:

Beware of farm lobbyists who compare 2019 exports to 2014: they’re just cherry-picking an unusually good year as a baseline. In reality, total agricultural exports were up in 2018 and are projected to decline about 4 percent this year, only a fraction of which is due to China.

¹Needless to say, this could change going forward after China announced new retaliatory tariffs in response to Trump’s increased tariffs from last week.

Edited by colion, 29 August 2019 - 09:59 PM.

[MaryAM]

I grew up in Indiana.  Thousands of acres of land were not farmed - because they were designated as in the "soil bank".  Farmers were paid not to plant crops.  Subsidies to farmers have been around for decades to control prices of products.  Still happening with dairy.  Please tell me why we are paying over $4 a gallon for milk when dairy farms are dumping milk.  Hard to tell a cow to dry up for awhile.   They could put more out on the market at a lower price and as a result sell more.  But then, what do I know.  

[diogenes227]

Looks like Trump might his save-my-{bleeeep} tariff meeting the Chinese before total desperation tears apart the farm country:

 

Wisconsin lost another 54 dairy farms in June on top of the 78 in May.

 

Mooga!

 

[Rich C]

I grew up in Indiana.  Thousands of acres of land were not farmed - because they were designated as in the "soil bank".  Farmers were paid not to plant crops.  Subsidies to farmers have been around for decades to control prices of products.  Still happening with dairy.  Please tell me why we are paying over $4 a gallon for milk when dairy farms are dumping milk.  Hard to tell a cow to dry up for awhile.   They could put more out on the market at a lower price and as a result sell more.  But then, what do I know.  

 

I had a friend in college who had a business plan.  He wanted to go into the "no hog raising" business.  He wanted to start small by not raising 50 hogs, and grow slowly until he was not raising about 250 hogs!

[diogenes227]

 

I grew up in Indiana.  Thousands of acres of land were not farmed - because they were designated as in the "soil bank".  Farmers were paid not to plant crops.  Subsidies to farmers have been around for decades to control prices of products.  Still happening with dairy.  Please tell me why we are paying over $4 a gallon for milk when dairy farms are dumping milk.  Hard to tell a cow to dry up for awhile.   They could put more out on the market at a lower price and as a result sell more.  But then, what do I know.  

 

I had a friend in college who had a business plan.  He wanted to go into the "no hog raising" business.  He wanted to start small by not raising 50 hogs, and grow slowly until he was not raising about 250 hogs!

 

 

 

A true blue American capitalist.