The House, the Senate and the USDA labored for months to reduce wasteful farm subsidies.
In the end, all the work amounted to only a minor trim.
At issue is the definition of "actively farming." The intent of the effort was to reduce the number of Americans who receive farm subsidies but don’t do any of the work.
People have been complaining about the loopholes in the farm subsidy program for years. The Environmental Working Group in a 2013 report pointed out that those receiving subsidies included Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker.
A report the same year from the Governmental Accountability Office pointed out that more than half a billion dollars a year is paid to multiple people who claimed to manage the same farm. The report described one instance in which 11 people claimed $1 million in subsidies, although several "appeared to have little involvement in farming operations."
Rep. Jeff Fortenberry succeeded in limiting the number in legislation that passed the House. Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa succeeded in putting a limit in the legislation that passed the Senate.
It’s exasperating that the limits were left out of the farm bill by House-Senate conferees.
The new regulations proposed last week by the USDA would require that managers document that they put in 500 hours of substantial management work or 25 percent of the time necessary. However, family-owned entities would be exempt. The USDA said only about 1,400 farming operations would lose eligibility.
Grassley reacted this way: "With the median income in America at about $52,000 a year, potentially paying more than a million dollars over the life of a farm bill to couples who aren’t even farming doesn’t meet the common-sense test."
Since big farm operations collect most of the subsidies – 10 percent of farms collect 75 percent of the subsidies – critics contend that young and beginning farmers are at a competitive disadvantage, chiefly because the big operations can pay more for land.
Meanwhile, a report from the University of Missouri projected that the 2014 farm bill will be the most expensive ever. The report predicted that two new types of crop insurance coverage will cost about $2.4 billion more than the direct payments they replaced.
The Center for Rural Affairs said the USDA’s proposed rule change does not meet the definition of reform, and criticized the White House and USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack for "taking a pass" on the opportunity to close a farm subsidy loophole.
The most positive thing that can be said about the proposed rule change is that it represents a "tiny step forward," as the Environmental Working Group put it. The public deserved more.
