Trump farm policy is pure
How embarrassing for US farmers. How embarrassing for Republican believers in small government.
Donald Trump’s administration this week unveiled US$12 billion ($17.5b) worth of farm subsidies.
In doing so it took a bold leap back to the days of socialist inefficiency that New Zealand has pushed back against for more than 30 years.
The move, which sees the Trump Administration using taxpayer money to buy milk, soy beans, pork and grain directly from farmers, is the inevitable consequence of the trade war.
China has hit back with targeted tariffs in ways that hurt US farmers in key battleground states.
To deliver the subsidy directly to affected farmers Trump has reactivated something called Commodity Credit Corp — a federal agency set up during the Great Depression.
To be fair, the move has provoked the ire of many Republican senators — in a way that has been conspicuously absent from the debate in other controversial areas.
“This Administration’s tariffs and bailouts aren’t going to make America great again, they’re just going to make it 1929 again,” said Senator Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican.
“My thoughts are the thoughts of farmers. They want trade, not aid. It’s really just that simple,” said Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin.
“You have a terrible policy that sends farmers to the poorhouse, and then you put them on welfare, and we borrow the money from other countries,” said Republican Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee. “It’s hard to believe there isn’t an outright revolt right now in Congress over what is happening.”
It looks like the implementation of a Soviet-style agricultural policy might finally have been a step too far for some.
I’m being a bit facetious here of course.
Farm subsidies for some specific sectors have lingered in the US, as they have in Europe for decades.
But before Trump blundered into the trade arena they were in decline and globally trade policy was headed in the right direction.
Time magazine reports that US subsidies had fallen to the lowest level since 1997.
It also notes the last time the US Government deployed an emergency subsidy programme was in 2012, although that was to mitigate an extreme drought and it was only US$170 million.
And it was deployed by Barack Obama, who we all know was a communist sympathiser.
Yes . . . being facetious again.
But the point is that this latest policy move highlights — again — that Trump has no allegiance to any coherent economic theory.
Some of his supporters find that refreshing. Fair enough.
But the hypocrisy of supporters who claim to be fiscally conservative knows no bounds.
New Zealand is generally considered politically to the left of the US.
Most National Party policy sits comfortably within the political boundaries of the US Democratic Party in so much as it retains support
“This Administration’s tariffs and bailouts aren’t going to make America great again, they’re just going to make it 1929 again.”
Senator Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican.