In a message dated 8/9/02 1:37:25 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
<< While it might be true that urban dwellers don't support direct farm subsidies to the same extent as rural dwellers (though my bet is that the support is still large) what they do support is food stamps which are another form of agricultural support - the quid pro quo between ag. subsidies and food stamps was always recognized in the political sphere. Alex Tabarrok >> Traditionally the small and indirect impact of food stamps on ag commondity prices has been utterly swamped by the large and direct impact of commondity price supports. I grew increasingly disillusioned with politics during my years in Iowa and for the last few stopped following what happened with commondity price supports; I know that under the Contract With America Congress passed a multi-year phaseout of the price-support program that would have had them all phased out by now (it didn't apply to the separate programs for tobacco, and the indirect federally-enforced milk and fruit cartels). Even if the ag price supports have been fully phased out, the food stamp program still has almost no impact on retail food prices, much less ag commodities, and of course urbanites don't think of food stamps as ag subsidies. What makes you suspect there's strong urban support for ag subidies (and would that include tobacco price supports and the government-enforced fruit and milk cartel arrangements)? I see little evidence for such support in the voting patterns of the reprentatives in Congress. David Levenstam
