20 thoughts on “The Farm Bill”

  1. Shouldn’t exist because the government shouldn’t give SNAP recipients anything, or shouldn’t exist because the government should give them something other than food stamps?

        1. There is a business cycle, with good years and bad years. States generally have to balance their budgets every year. In good years, state revenues grow, and spending on state-level programs can grow. In bad years, revenues fall, and states must cut spending in order to keep budgets in balance.

          If food stamps are only provided by states, food stamp spending will be more generous in good years and less generous in bad years. Meanwhile, the need for food assistance will follow precisely the opposite pattern.

          If you want food assistance programs to address the need for food assistance, you don’t want them funded at the state level.

          3. Really Jim? Bloat during the good times and starve during the lean times is all you’ve got? And the ONLY remedy is federal “help?” The concept of saving during the good times to cover the lean times is as old as the Pharoah who took the advice of a Jewish slave. States don’t HAVE to spend all of their excess revenue. They can pay some into a rainy day fund. It’s called fiscal discipline.

          4. That graph shows that our last recession was worse than any recent one, and that the US population has grown. Hence, more people who qualify for food stamps. What other conclusion should I draw?

            States don’t HAVE to spend all of their excess revenue

            I’m not even sure that most states technically have the option of saving enough revenue to increase spending in lean times, particularly times as lean as the period we’ve just gone through. But even if they did, in practice it’s a political impossibility. As soon as a surplus appears there are calls to return it to the taxpayers. The same dynamic applies at the Federal level; remember George W. Bush and Alan Greenspan warning of the dangers of federal surpluses in 2001?

            Curt’s graph shows 46.6 million people getting food stamps. It’s crazy to think that states would have put away enough money to meet that demand if the program had been funded on the state level. So as I wrote earlier, if you want a food assistance program to address the need for food assistance, you don’t want it funded at the state level.

          5. Thanks for not answering my questions Jim. How many people in this country on food stamps would concern you? 100 million? 200 million? What level of spending would give you pause? 100 billion a year? 300 billion?

    2. Shouldn’t be done by any government because if people can’t afford to feed themselves they can go to ANY CHARITY EVER and get help.

        1. Maybe I’m nuts.

          I guess I’m just someone who believes that government is not “what we decide to do together”. At best it is “what we decide together to point guns at”. More realistically, it is “what a slight temporary majority of politicians decide to point guns at”. And the whole point of the Constitution is to restrict the set of legitimate targets for what those guns can be pointed at, namely criminals and foreign invaders.

          But, I guess with people like Jim it’s OK to point guns at middle class people to force them to pay for “charity” (food stamps), or else get shot if those middle class people refuse to give to the “charity”.

          Yep, I guess I’m nuts.

    3. Sorry people, I think I am “in with” Jim on the SNAP program.

      Were the healthcare program organized anything along the same lines.

      Here me out. Everybody, and I mean everybody gets a Healthcare EBT (electronic balance transfer card), and everyone pays for routine, diagnostic, screening, and “minor” healthcare using that card. No stigma, no Medicaid, no nothing. “Catastrophic” and “major medical” can be taken care of under a high deductible insurance, just as you can such policies now, or at least until January when Obamacare outlaws such a thing.

      People who are without financial means would have funds applied to their card after “means testing”, just like with the SNAP program for food. People with financial means could pay into a medical savings account, or they could be sent a bill. If you give people of modest financial means a tax deduction or even a tax credit to help them afford medical care, people could be sent a 1099-like notice in advance of their filing taxes. The CMS (those friendly folks at the ferral gummint who administer Medicare reimbursements) can even run this system.

      People could purchase prepaid health plans or even get health care plans or subsidy through their employer, but it would all be “plugged in” to this one card.

      What I am after with this system is that people would be paying out-of-pocket (through this card) for market-based fee-for-service health care, with all of the accompanying benefits. Just as people see with the fee-for-service Lasik eye surgery market.

      And yes. Everyone would be on this system, even seniors. And the caps on Medicare reimbursement would be removed. This will be just like another essential human need, food, where you pay the market price for your food, whether with your own coin or with the SNAP card.

      1. Everybody, and I mean everybody gets a Healthcare EBT (electronic balance transfer card)

        I already have a debit card and those things aren’t hard to get. Healthcare EBT doesn’t add any value.

      2. FWIW, I believe that Obamacare “bronze” plans can have deductibles as high as $6,350 per year for individuals and $12,700 per year for families. Is that really not high enough?

          3. What should happen when your self-insurance runs dry?

            Jim, the dollars are going to run dry one way or another. If a financial resource is to run dry, I’d rather it be your money rather than society’s money.

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