There's a clip going around with MSNBC interviewing North Carolina farmers about why they still support Trump, even though he keeps kicking them in the face.
As yet another North Carolina farmer, I would love to add some context!
To understand US agriculture right now, you have to start with their wealth situation.
Most of US farmers today are quite well off financially, thanks to inherited wealth. And a lot of them are way more skilled at complaining on TV than they are at running the farm they inherited.
I don't know Batten, but Kim Kornegay in particular is one of the least reliable narrators you could hope to find on agriculture.
Kim once cornered me at a meeting to complain about how she "tried to make more money, she really did" by farming asparagus.
But she had no idea how. Didn't make any effort to learn how to grow & sell it properly before starting. Failed. And blamed everyone but herself.
Trying to be diplomatic, I said "Yep that's why we always start with a small trial plot, right? So we don't lose too much money if it doesn't work."
I meant, like, 1/8 - 1/4 acre. You want to start SMALL w produce bc it's always more work than you'd ever think possible.
She said "But I did! I only planted 15 acres!"
Her family's got so much land (they farm multiple square miles of NC), she thought 15 acres WAS a small trial plot. 💀
15 acres is more property than most Americans will ever own!
By the way this conversation happened in a large arena/convention hall with her family's name on it.
"Poor salt of the earth" these folks are not.
Some more context for this interview: NC farmers used to make $$$ on tobacco thanks to a New Deal program.
It was a top-down federal quota that limited who could grow tobacco. Drove its price up WAY beyond what a free market would ever support.
That was in place until 2004.
So for nearly a century, most NC farmers didn't have to deal with a free, competitive market for their products.
Including the families that produced the fine people interviewed here! That's how they built their wealth & learned everything they know about farming.
Taxpayers!
And here we see the result: People who get born into wealth that was built on the taxpayer dime.
They never develop the entrepreneurship skills needed to survive on their own.
Of course they're begging for handouts. It's the only life they've ever known.
"85% of what happens on a farm is up to God" I'm sorry, no.
YOU own the land. YOU decide what you plant.
When YOU choose to keep raising things like cattle & tobacco, that have been known for decades now for unreliable income even in a good year- you can't blame God for that!
NC has some of the best farmland in the country. You can grow just about anything here. It's truly special.
If I had hundreds or thousands of acres of NC farmland & still couldn't figure out how to make money, you better believe wild horses couldn't drag that info out of me!
To wrap it up, here's some important info on US farmers & wealth.
Most US farmers today are millionaires- yes, small family farms too. They make way more take-home pay, AFTER farm debts & expenses, than non-farmers.
It's been like that since 1998.
ps. The $1.2M median net worth for US small family farms? Yeah that puts you in the top 10% of Americans for wealth.
Agriculture in the United States has some real, deep, & sticky problems.
But "farmers are poor" ain't one of them.
I want US agriculture to succeed.
And success starts with getting out of the "poor lil me" mindset, understanding that we're grownups with a business, and dealing with markets like an adult.
Not shooting ourselves in the foot, over & over, and crying for mama every time.
@sarahtaber In the last few years of his life, my dad surprised me by telling me he wanted to keep working his family farm. I always thought he wanted out of farming, which is why he became a college professor. I guess grandpa wasn't very good at the business side, so dad was usually making money decisions. Sometime before 1960 when dad was in college, grandpa increased the dairy herd without consulting Dad and put the farm in bad financial state. Neither blamed the government.
@sarahtaber Dad knew dairy was coming under increased regulation. He taught biology, botany, and ecology. He said, after he saw raw milk under a microscope in college, he never wanted to drink it again. He always ordered meat well done for much the same reason.