RE: Farm "subsidy" data base

["Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx>]

Gene writes: >I put "subsidy" in quotation marks because I think of farm payments as covering the overhead costs, while proceeds from crop sales cover the out-of-pocket costs of getting a crop.  <

 

I don't understand this. Why do you see "subsidies" as covering overhead costs? it seems to me that they instead reflect the political clout of the Farm Bureau, farm-state senators, etc. "Welfare mothers," on the other hand, don't have that kind of clout...

Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxx &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine