Why not cut WIC cards?

[underpants]

All this talk... or actually the threat of talking by one Senator... about cutting unemployment benefits is absurd. Unemployment is in the top three of having the best bang-for-our-stimulus-buck along with infrastructure improvements and "Food stamps" programs (WIC cards for one).

So why no grandstanding on food stamps?

Why?

Because BigAgra would come down on any mention of it with money and influence that would make the health insurance companies look like poseurs.
BigAgra relies on food programs to not only buy their products directly but it also falsely inflates demands.

Food programs are of course "the right thing to do" and they are effective in maintaining the threat of civil unrest (people ARE going to eat) but the system we have right now is basically government subsidies.....some might call it "socialism" if they didn't understand what a "mixed economy" is.

[Orrex]

1. A fine point!

K/R

[kagi]

2. Food Stamps

WIC offers specific coupons for specific types of products, whereas food stamp cards are likely what you are talking about. WIC coupons are typically for milk, formula, eggs, etc, while food stamp cards can be used for any 'food' purchase.

BigAgra doesn't really give much of a rip about foodstamps, they're concerned with making sure that import quotas and blocks are maintained on items like cane sugar, and that we add even more corn based ethanol to gasoline, and that school lunch programs continue. Why bother with the little people when they can lock in contracts and subsidies to ensure that their products remain expensive at the retail level? Not to mention their deep desire to increase the per gallon ethanol subsidy from 50 cents to 75 cents, and secure loan guarantees for their members to create even more ethanol plants that'll be soon abandoned.

[anonymous171]

3. I don't mind the sugar cane block.

And ethanol is a very poor excuse for an alternative fuel anyways.

[underpants]

8. It is a nice little vicious circle

the price floor on sugar (about 50 cents to a dollar price inflation per pound) keeps profits high for BigSugar and food producers (who buys tons of sweetener per day) had to look elsewhere so they started buying high fructose corn products so AMD makes bank too.

[livetohike]

4. Welcome to DU!

:hi:

[kagi]

5. Thanks for the welcome

n/t

[underpants]

7. Welcome to DU

:hi:

You made a much better point than I did


At least 43 percent of ADM's annual profits are from products heavily subsidized or protected by the American government. Moreover, every $1 of profits earned by ADM's corn sweetener operation costs consumers $10, and every $1 of profits earned by its ethanol operation costs taxpayers $30
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-241.html

and yes that is the Cato Institute

[liberal N proud]

6. Same would happen to farm subsidies

Which in a way are no different that Food Stamps or other welfare programs.

[Hannah Bell]

10. farm subsidies have a purpose; they keep cropland in production or reserve, instead of in sub-

divisions.

[liberal N proud]

12. What subdivisions are they going to build in the middle of Iowa?

I have a cousin in NW Iowa raking in 1 million dollars in subsidies.

[Hannah Bell]

13. ones like this:

New homes replace farmland in Dallas County, Iowa, as suburbs of Clive and Waukee grow on the west side of Des Moines. Photo by Lynn Betts. All photos courtesy of NRCS.


and this (solon, iowa):

"Tucked away between two ponds, rolling farmland, and a golf course, this subdivision begs you to stay home!"



http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://windmillestatessolon.com/&usg=__byrJ4fUlCUMcS6Ew4KnIpdzrzvE=&h=554&w=684&sz=70&hl=en&start=7&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=J5kGZ_-InNNDpM:&tbnh=113&tbnw=139&prev=/images%3Fq%3Diowa%2Bfarmland%2Bsubdivisions%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26tbs%3Disch:1


and this:



There is a nice stretch of farmland between my in-laws neighborhood and the highway just outside Davenport that will soon be gone. It is the type of farmland that you picture when people talk about Iowa.... It has been reduced to “developable acres”.

www.russellpreston.com/blog/


There were multiple reasons for FDR's initiation of farm subsidies.

[liberal N proud]

14. 85.6% of Iowa is still rural

85.6%

I don't think the farmland is endangered and farm subsidies have been around long before Davenport, Dallas County and Clive, Waukee and Des Moines grew to their current size.

I don't think you have to worry about Iowa becoming one giant city. It isn't going to happen.

And the farm subsidies usually are paying farmers to set land aside for the year or to cover the difference in what they sold their crops for and some pre-determined inflated number.

Iowa Fact Sheet: http://www.ers.usda.gov/statefacts/ia.htm

[Hannah Bell]

20. whatever. try reading some history.

[LeftyMom]

17. Nobody's building subdivisions right now.

Not in BFE or anywhere else, because nobody will buy new homes with the prices of existing homes kept so low due to the glut of foreclosures.

[havocmom]

19. More realistically: they bring some balance to what producers get for crops

and what they SHOULD BE GETTING for crops.

They don't get to set the prices for what they sell. They have to pay retail for equipment and supplies. The government has a vested interest in keeping food prices low. (I know, people think they pay too much, but the actual producers don't get enough increase to cover their costs; look to the 'added value' businesses for the price you pay at the checkout)

Think of subsidies as trying to help producers keep some balance between what it costs them and what they sell it for.

And there are programs that pay producers to be better stewards of land and wildlife.

[Hannah Bell]

21. the two aspects are connected. when farm prices are low, farms go under. & get subdivided.

[havocmom]

22. the payments came long before the developers

As did the recognition that the government had a vested interest in helping prevent farming methods that contributed to the Black Blizzard that destroyed so much crop land in the 30s. Both price help and better land protection pre-date the rush to pave the farms.

[Hannah Bell]

23. not sure what your point is. there's nothing contradictory between what i'm saying & what you are.

[havocmom]

25. Point is not about land developers gobbling up farms

[Hannah Bell]

26. They go together. Bankrupt farmers sell their land. To whoever pays the highest price.

[wellstone dem]

9. Food stamps were originally started as a farm subsidy program

not because folks cared about hungry people. But if you question the economic impact of food stamps, go to a grocery store and tell them you are organizing a boycott of their store by food stamp users because of disrespectful treatment by cashiers. I've seen it done, and it worked.

[cutlassmama]

11. End the wars and tax the top 2%, problem solved.

[Union Yes]

15. ADM "Supermarket to the World" learned from Ray-gun to just say no. KNR

No to threatening their profits if pols cut food stamp cards and wic.

[LeftyMom]

16. WIC is an agriculture program, not a human services program.

The point of it isn't to feed poor people well, it's to keep commodity prices up. That's why, until recently, most of the food choices offered where spectacularly crappy.

That's why Republicans bitch all day long about welfare programs and NEVER mention WIC.

[dflprincess]

18. Food subsidy programs keep the cannon fodder healthy

During WWII one thing that shocked doctors at induction centers was the number of young men who were classed as unfit for service because they had problems that were the result of poor nutrition in childhood (these guys being the children of the Depression). And that is one of the big reasons food subsidy programs came to be.

Or so one of my professors in School of Social Work at the U of Minn told us.

[underpants]

24. 40%

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=3441535&mesg_id=3441540

ANSWER-National Security. About 40% of WWII draftees were rejected due to ill heath, bad eyesight, or bad teeth due to malnutrition, a result of the Great Depression amongst other things

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_School_Lunch_Act

Establishment of the program
The main driving force to the establishment of the program was not what many would think (only health and nutrition issues), but also national security. The driving force behind the program was actually General George C. Marshall, then a minister on the cabinet in the Truman's Government.
During the WWII, the United States facing the needs for an expanding military to cope with war on two fronts. However many of the conscripts, especially those from working class families had had a hard life in the great depression of the 1930s and had adverse effects on their health. This led to an increasing number of conscripts not meeting basic health requirements for basic military services. This is caused alarm at the Department of Defense as it adversely affected the ability to meet the US troop requirements.
As soon as the WWII was finished, the US was already preparing for the next fight with Communism lead by the Soviet Union. It is with this in mind, with planners preparing for the next wave of conscriptions, that the US launched the National School Lunch Act as a means to boost overall health and nutrition for its population.

http://www.educationbug.org/a/the-history-of-the-school...
The History of the School Lunch Program


President Harry S. Truman began the national school lunch program in 1946 as a measure of national security.
He did so after reading a study that revealed many young men had been rejected from the World War II draft due to medical conditions caused by childhood malnutrition. Since that time more than 180 million lunches have been served to American children who attend either a public school or a non-profit private school.

http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/2395/School-...
The National School Lunch Program
During World War II, many U.S. draftees were found to be malnourished to such an extent that they were turned down for military service. The realization of this low nutritional state of the general population led to the passage of the National School Lunch Act (NSLA) in 1946, which established the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) in elementary and secondary schools. This landmark legislation, although amended many times, continues in force today, with its original objectives still in place. These objectives are "to safeguard the health and well-being of the Nation's children, and to encourage the domestic consumption of nutritious agricultural commodities and other food."