A little action on the side...
Gaming the crop insurance system has been going on since it was invented, of course, but the practice has spread to even my area - not a big area normally for FCI - as producers bet on a seasonal price drop via GRP policies.
It going to be more expensive to place such bets, and it looks like the house is adjusting the slam-dunk odds that favored this practice in 2005 especially. Run your numbers on this excellent analysis tool.
Looks to me like we're turning the safety net into a fishing net.
2 comments:
So we taxpayers guarantee the largest famers with the largest payments. It only follows that we should give the largest farmers the largest guaranteed incomes with FCI. It only makes sense that we should pay billions to all beginning farmers in order that these farmers can compete with the recipients of the multimillion FCI policies that guarantee profitability and inflate all input costs.
Regardless of the fairness of subsidizing crop insurance, I am struck by the futility. Guaranteed profits are an oxymoron - the market quickly seeks them out and is doing so now via land (and to a lesser extent, input) costs.
I am always struck however by the astonishing hubris of program crop farmers who genuinely believe other citizens owe them this support.
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