Food prices rising? Some in government want them higher
Posted on May 5th, 2008 by bile Categories and Tags: Uncategorized, America, American Sugar Alliance, Bush administration, cartel, Center for Trade Policy Studies, Colin Peterson, Congress, corporatism, economics, ethanol, food, food prices, food processors, fucking retarded, House Agriculture Committee, Minnesota, monopoly, nanny state, politics, regulation, subsidies, United States, Wall Street Journal, your money, your rightshttp://www.cato-at-liberty.org/…
Not content with a protected near monopoly of the domestic market, American sugar producers are demanding that Congress make their pot of subsidies and protection even sweeter.
Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, Rep. Colin Peterson (D-Minn.), is pushing language in the latest proposed farm bill that would raise domestic price supports for sugar and mandate that sugar imports be used for ethanol production.
His proposals would virtually lock in an 85 percent share of the U.S. market for domestic sugar beet and cane growers, even though a number of foreign countries can grow sugar more cheaply than most American growers. And by the way, did I mention that Rep. Peterson’s district is among the nation’s top producers of sugar beets?
The Bush administration, to its credit, opposes Peterson’s changes in the farm bill. The sugar industry, of course, loves the idea. A spokesman for the pro-protection American Sugar Alliance told this morning’s Wall Street Journal, “We have an administration that seems more interested in supporting foreign producers, than producers right here in America.”
Notice the sugar industry doesn’t mention American consumers. U.S. agricultural policies should not be about favoring “our” producers over “theirs,” but about advancing such national interests as freedom, prosperity, and a more peaceful world. As we’ve explained in detail at the Center for Trade Policy Studies, the U.S. sugar program favors American sugar producers primarily at the expense of the rest of America. American families pay higher prices at the store, while U.S. producers that use sugar as an input — bakeries, food processors, restaurants, candy makers, etc. — incur higher costs because of our sugar program.
As we read daily in the newspaper about soaring food prices, this Congress is the verge of passing a farm bill designed explicitly to raise domestic food prices.
::sigh::
They cause the high sugar prices in the first place. They cause the high prices of milk. The high prices of wheat and corn and soy beans. They deflate the money and cause prices in general to rise. The people of world and particularly the American public suffers so that the few sugar manufacturers my thrive.
And when the people start to revolt they will ignorantly run to the government to fix the problem not realizing they caused it in the first place.
6 Responses to “Food prices rising? Some in government want them higher”
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May 6th, 2008 at 6:37 am
The almost silver lining in this extremely dark cloud is that sugar based ethanol production is very efficient in comparison to corn. Brazil has had success with their sugar ethanol program for decades now. Of course this goes along with the low sugar production labor cost they have. However, as expected we have plenty of protectionist tariffs to keep out that sweet sugar. In the end, some savings in fuel costs used to transport food should get passed down to the end consumer. I’m sure our intellectual betters in Washington will do good job of raising prices regardless.
May 6th, 2008 at 7:09 am
Ethanol is a questionable fuel regardless of subsides. Last I checked it provides less energy for the cost and leads to smog in colder climates. The increased cost of all things which contain sugar will out weigh any possible cost reduction in government mandated combo fuels.
May 6th, 2008 at 7:26 am
Ethanol represents the death throws of Otto’s internal combustion engine. While the production of ethanol from almost anything other than corn is more efficient, the process of creating and burning hydrocarbons to release the energy they contain is not particularly efficient.
It’s interesting to note that a lot of people erroneously criticize the link between fossil fuel usage and ethanol production. They should criticize the efficiency of the ethanol production process. For example people often complain that it takes one gallon of fossil fuel to make 1.3 gallons of ethanol from corn. What they should complain about is that fact that it takes one gallon of any fuel to make 1.3 gallons of ethanol. Criticize the efficiency of the process, not the substances currently used to create the energy because they can always change.
The same applies to the people who complain about how initially coal would be used to power electric cars. Storing electrical energy and using it to power a vehicle allows a more adaptive vehicle than relying on the ICE. I would invest my time in developing better ways of storing electrical energy than refining ways of storing chemical energy.
Unfortunately very few people in the world, including governments as well as private businesses, seem to have enough of an understanding of the underlying scientific concepts to solve the impending energy crunch.
May 6th, 2008 at 7:53 am
There are plenty of people who understand how to deal with this government induced crunch. Government interference both retards development and testing along with restricting utilizing existing fuel sources. Battery tech is a huge R&D business right now because mobile gadgets with ever increasing power requirements demand it along with the green fad. In just the past year we’ve seen flexible solar panels, far higher efficiency solar panels, advances in nano tech with battery possibilities, safer lith-ion tech, fuel cell advances, etc. Those techs either will take time to figure out how to mass produce and/or is being held back by government regulation. We’ve only recently had the technology and the desire to search for new forms of energy production and storage.
May 6th, 2008 at 8:13 am
Any bets on long before a congressional hearing on regulating nano-technology?
May 6th, 2008 at 8:51 am
Nano-technology is one of the worst terms ever. What does it apply to? Technology at the nanometer scale? There are all kinds of things that, that could apply to. Sun dials, cellular respiration as well as tiny mechanical parts. The average law maker thinks nano-technology is little robots in your blood that fix things. Hell they might think we already have that. It almost pisses me off as much as the recent scare over "Biotechnology" [sic]. Biotechnology is thousands of years old! So is cloning! Arggggghhh! SO MUCH ANGRY!