The Farm Bill is $1 Trillion of Business as Usual

Jun 5, 2013 | 2 min read | Print Article

The Farm Bill IS NOT a Deficit Reduction Bill

The Farm Bill IS a Baseline Protection Bill

The Ag Committee circles the wagons to keep more cash under their purview, squandering billions from eliminating discredited direct payments, and taking credit for $6 billion in sequester savings
Three redundant “shallow loss” income entitlement programs are created to keep subsidies flowing to a sector projected to generate record farm profits in 2013
- Supplemental Coverage Option (SCO) – 65% subsidized
- Stacked Income Protection (STAX) – 80% subsidized
- Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) – 100% subsidized

The Farm Bill IS NOT a Response to the Drought

The bulk of this bill was written in 2011, long before the drought occurred
This bill is not an evaluation of what worked and what did not in 2012
This bill makes taxpayers responsible for guaranteeing revenue for select producers through new, parochial crop insurance carve-outs: peanut revenue, catfish margin, business interruption for poultry, seafood harvesters, alfalfa, and more.

The Farm Bill Ignores Economic Reality and the Deficit

The Agriculture economy is booming, having experienced its two best years in a generation and this year is projected to be even better
This bill is designed to funnel cash when times are good, but not great, through “shallow loss” programs. Shallow is by definition not catastrophic
Sequestration is in full force, yet this bill diverts billions of savings from eliminating direct payments to create new entitlement programs
Crop insurance has exceeded its CBO score at passage every year since the last Farm Bill. There is no evidence this expensive trend will change

This trillion dollar business-as-usual farm bill IS NOT in the interests of taxpayers.

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