In an Election Year, Food and Farm Policy Should be Part of the Debate

Food is the ultimate kitchen-table issue. In an election year, food and farm issues should have a prominent place on the policy menu, because conditions for farm workers, farm subsidies and farm pollution are among the big issues that affect Americans' health and the environment. Consider:

  • Farm and food workers have some of the nation’s most dangerous jobs and don’t get paid a living wage. Little has been done to ensure that these workers receive the same protections and rewards as the rest of us. Likewise, too little attention is given to addressing how we protect farm workers from pesticides linked to serious health problems, including cancer.
  • Farmers need a sensible safety net. But farm subsidies overwhelmingly flow to the largest and most successful farm businesses. From 1995 to 2014, the top 10 percent of subsidy recipients were paid 75 percent of all farm subsidies, while the bottom 80 percent of subsidy recipients each received less than $10,000. In that period, the top 1 percent of recipients got 25 percent of all farm subsidies, for a total of $62.8 billion. That's unfair, wasteful and defies common sense.  

  • Recent efforts to make crop insurance the primary tool by which taxpayers support farm income have only increased these inequities. On average, taxpayers provide 62 percent of a grower’s crop insurance premium. But unlike other subsidies, crop insurance premium subsidies are not subject to a means test or payment limit. While some of the nation’s most successful farm businesses annually receive more than $1 million in premium support, the bottom 80 perent received about $5,000.

  • Who are the lucky millionaires and billionaires receiving these subsidies? We don’t know. We do know, thanks to a 2015 report by the Government Accountability Office, that four individuals with a net worth greater than $1.5 billion in 2013 received crop insurance subsidies.

  • The broken subsidy system impacts what we grow and how we grow it, which can be bad for our health and the environment. While many farmers are taking simple steps to protect our environment and public health, most are not, in large part because the incentives are all backward.

A lot is at stake for food and farm policy. It must remain a main course on the America's table. 

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