O/T ..FB Meeting /. discussion / comments /

Over 150 yrs ago , Daniel Webster is supposed to have Said to the effect , "As to where Agriculture Goes, SO GOES THE COUNTRY " ,Do we still Believe that to hold true today in the modern World of Animals,seed genetics , and powerful tractors ???

we all eat 3 time a day,,,,every day,,,,,makes sence ta me

So true, 4010 guy, Food for thought .. in Websters time the nation was more than 90%agrarian with a commonsense VOICE.. TODAY those percentages are reversed ....organizations such as PETA,Humane Society of the United States ,and many abundant vew Organizations that will no doubt be mentioned are lobbying to be heard .. Does American agriCULTURE still ave a VOICE that is listened to and RESPECTED?..... please keep this one cival so it don't go to the"POOF GALAXY"

Jim, you and I both know that the welfare and security of our nation depends upon a healthy farming industry...be it small farms or the megaconglomerates, America has to eat. And those of us who remember when we had to sell wheat to Russia to help insure their survival, wh know how helpless we would've felt as a nation if the roles were reversed.

But today, I really don't see any ONE national organization who speaks for the farmer. In years past, there was the Grange...and then the NFO and the Farm Bureau more recently...but these days, I simply don't see anyone unifying farmers with a single voice. And with lobbyists carrying more and more weight not only in Washington but in state legislatures, the farmers certainly have a need for a voice that can be heard.

And these days, I'm not sure the Farm Bureau is getting anyone's attention...but I don't know that any organization representing the farmers is being heard anymore.

I think you should check your percentages. I think that only 1% of the population is involved in agriculture. And most of the crops are produced by a small fraction of that number. I got this off the web.

This article in the New York Times tells us:

According to the Agriculture Department, nonfarm jobs now account for more than 90 percent of farm households' incomes.

The EPA article also mentions that 64.9% of farms (or around 1.3 million) are Residential/Lifestyle, Retirement or Farming Sales < $100,000. According to the USDA these farms only account for 10% of the total value of all agricultural production. The vast majority of these type of farmers do not report farming as their major occupation. Only 35% of the 2.1 million farms (or around 735,000) are large farms that have workers that consider their occupation to be farming. This explains how the number of farmers can be lower than the total number of reported farms.

The prison population of 2.1 million is larger than the EPA's number of 960,000 persons claiming farming as their principal occupation, the BLS's number of nearly 1.3 million farmers, ranchers, and agricultural managers, or the EPA's number of 1.9 primary and secondary occupation farmers.

Actually, at best 1.9 million farmers, including "lifestyle" ( hobby farmers? ) compared to a population of 310 million leaves a percentage of 6 tenths of 1 percent.

And the average age is in the mid 50's.

Have a good night!!

agreed ,it does seem overwhelming , Maybe I am clangin My biblical cymbal in the wind , however , it Sure beats doin nuthin.. Havin a cause GIVES YOU LIFE !.. Spook gave us a sobering fact if it is accurate , and I would bet a dollar to a donut, THERE ARE LESS FARMERS THAN THERE ARE PEOPLE IN PRISON ! , ..nOW , that is a situation to say a few good nite payers for ,,,,, goodnite , jim

USDA AG Census came out last week. 2.1 million farmers in the US (about .6% of the population as I understand it based on an estimated 308,000,000 population googled.). %60 of these farms make less than $10,000 annually. So only 40% of the 2.1 million make more than $10,000. 40 percent of 2.1 million is 840,000. What portion of those make say $30,000 net profit in a year (a small living).
Real number of actual farms might be as low as 500,000. Or about 1/4 of 1 percent of the population.
A group that small needs a lot of friends to have any voice at all.

I dont know how it gets there,but farming needs to come back like it was with family farms,coops,and small towns.What we have now is just asking for disaster.Whether it sinks into any of the"educated"folks head or not,everything depends on agriculture.If you mess up agriculture,and its like its been in a war since at least the 1970s,maybe 1950s,you mess up the country.Lots of other things could have been done besides run all the farm kids off,claim that it was better to go to college and get into agri business.That was a big blunder.Agri business is like the anti agriculture,worship big business,kind of ignorance religion.The Antichrist of agriculture.Its caused the whole country to turn into a weird house of cards thats about to crash down on fire and there is no telling what will emerge from the ashes.Probably something more like a snake or worm than a Thunderbird.All big business should be broken into smaller ones,laws should be passed that farms cannot be bigger than 500 acres for grain and different sizes for other operations,but nothing like there is now.The biggest tractor anybody could buy needs to be about 80 horsepower,and a law needs to be passed for that too.Pay should be as good or better than a doctor or lawyers,and there should be government controls on any stock market to keep prices from being held artificially low,or unfair advantage for the paper pushers.To keep it like this tampering with it should carry a very long prison sentence,for anybody including the President.
Instead of 600,000 farmers we need 12 million like there was before all this nonsense got started.That would bring the country back because there would be farming communities again,people living in the country because there are farmers living in the country.It should have always been this way and all this hyped up crap we have now is a result of the inmates running the asylum.If that goes over well and we arent starving,instead of farmers getting bigger,maybe they should be cut to 250 acres,and tractors down to 70 horsepower,and the pay stay the same.Also the food needs to be fairly priced,people encouraged to work,but nobody better not starve for lack of food or whoever causes that to happen should get life or execution.The days of middlemen getting rich while farmers go bankrupt needs a sentence of life or execution for anybody causing that to happen too,even the president.
I just watched nearly the whole movie "Sicko"by Micheal Moore yesterday.Its not just farming we have been misled about.With all the hype out of Washington DC since Nixon about health care,it will make you fighting mad to see this show.Not at Micheal Moore like they try to hype it,but at the government and everybody in government for letting this happen and taking money from lobbyists,and thats both sides.France has the best,and its free in France,England,Cuba and Canada,We are down around 38th or so,and lots of the technology the world has was paid for with our tax dollars.Its disgusting,and its not working peoples fault,its rich peoples fault.Greed,deception,and a big long list of things people do for money,which truly is the root of all evil.
Yeah we ventured out in space a little.We were on top,but now we are nearly ruined.We have been used and abused by both sides,and now it looks like we are finished.If we ever get out of this,and go out in space somewhere,we will need to be a lot better of a being than we are now.This bunch running things is evil and a failure as well.We might have to take it away from them before its over for good.This is not going to stand very much longer Im afraid,and who is going to come save us?We saved everybody in Europe heck even the world,and what we get for it is betrayed by our own government for some money?Then in our own free country the crooks enslaved us,and made us miserable,all the while hyping how good it was to do things their way.The people that need to die cold,hungry,in the dark,are the ones that took the lobbyist money and looked the other way while the country fell apart,and the lobbyists that thought it was good to use and abuse the people to get rich.Probably wont be them suffering though.Seems like thats reserved for the good people that work hard all their life,and give their neighbor the shirt off their own back.

Well, If Michael Moore said it you know it was a LIE that clown

Trucker40, I feel sorry for you. You believe in Michael Moore but not the American farmer. Farming is NOT about money. Farming is about the love for the land you work. It's about hard work, and long, long hours on the tractor, or in the combine. It's about making things grow, and making a living with your two hands. If it was only about making money, I wouldn't be a farmer!

Utopia...........something quite similar, with all the needed 'laws', was tried in parts of the world, beginning in 1917.

There is the problem. Up until the 40's there were more farmers than folks living in the cities, so the voting was more ag based which gave the influence on issues an ag slant. Now however with only a small fraction of the population farming. The votes are as goes the big cities so goes the influence. This has also helped the anti based organizations Gain ground faster as time goes on, ( Peta,Greenpeace,and so on) as the public has no idea of how their food arrives to them. Other than Kroger or Wal- Mart or you pick the store. If half of them saw the places that their food was kept/handled they wouldn't eat it. LOL

We've seen what's happened to the poultry and pork parts of farming over the last 20 or 30 years; it won't be as simple for the cattle, grain and fiber part of farming to go that route, but it's slowly and SURELY happening.

are you honestly implying that CUBA has better health care than the USA?

Please, please go there and take as many believers with you as you can find

Food prices would go down if there was less demand. I say we stop feeding Michael Moore! Slogan could be Moore is less!

I was raised on a farm till I was 15 years old. Parents divorced and lost the farm at the same time. I am 32 years old know and would give any thing to be back in the farming business. It is nearly impossible get back in with the price of equipment and land. Local mega farm offered me a job paying 13.00 dollars an hour working 80 hours a week no over time. I work for a excavating company paying 19.00 dollars an hour working 50 hours a week with time and a half overtime. I have looked for information on getting back into farming thru local F.B. office and county extension but I get the cold shoulder and the feeling if your not farming 5000 acres your wasting their time. One idea I had was if there was a older farmer who was thinking of retiring and had no one to pass his farm to I would be interested in working for him for a period of time to learn what made him succesful. After this time period work out a buy out or payment plan or aquire financing so that he could retire. If any body has any ideas or comments I would love to hear them.

Obviously, there's more to life than a paycheck, but it appears you're grossing better than $1000 per week; no way I'd give that up to start farming, not full-time anyway. Lots of folks.......who've never depended on it for a living........have a distorted view of what's involved; it can be very rewarding, but the stress can be a killer. For some folks, 50 hours may seem like a lot; for all the years I farmed, our 'normal' work week was 55 hours (10 hours through the week and 5 on Saturday); in the Spring and Fall, it could stretch to 90 hours or more. And.........I never milked a cow; who knows what dairymen's hours were.

Two things build the value of raw materials and resources.
1] Industry of all types and products, from homes, to spacecraft.
2] The other is Farming.

Our worthless economists are so far removed from value added processes that they would not recognize one if they saw it. They have been Displacing the management rich high effort things like jobs!, and slicing the service industry pie into ever smaller wedges with financial trowels. Lets fill in that hole and call it a repaired pothole. JimN

trucker40,
wow, what a rant. Tell us how you REALLY feel. LOL
Actually, comrade Trucker40, Thurlow is right. Your socialist methods ("do as I say or we'll punish you if you buy too big of a tractor"???LOL) have been tried and failed. Think about it. When the country was 90% agrarian, the efficiency of the American farmer was LOW compared to what he can produce today. Large tractors, combines, better yielding seed, fertilizer are all products of AGRI-BUSINESS. Nothing evil about that. Just means that, as a nation, we can feed ourselves using less labor. Means those ex-farmers can go to work producing something else. That has contributed to a rise in our standard of living over the years (compared to our parents/grand-parents).

Same is true of industry. Mass-producing cars (and tractors) made them affordable to the average American. This contributed to a huge economic expansion in the last century.

The computer industry has created efficiencies all across our economy and allowed our economy to expand over the last 40 years. Problem: Where do we go from here to get that next leap in tecnological innovation that will provide even more efficiency (and consequential growth)? Computerization and miniaturization continues to provide benefits but Ipods and picture-phones are not going to be equivalent to Henry Ford's tractor. LOL.

If someone were to ask, I'd put my money on a switch from a petroleum based energy industry over the next 20-50 yrs.

As for Michael Moore, he knows what sells. The truth matters little to him.

Trucker40 I Agree with you on the small farm issue and I've thought the same thing many times we would be better off with many small farms than a few big ones. However the path to that is not more laws mandated how people run their businesses, the goverment's job is to create a business environment where small operators in any business can compete equally with big business. In today's world of enviromental laws, building restrictions, regulations upon regulations only the big operators with lots of capital and other resources can compete. While we're are at it our kids would be better off if dad went to work and mom stayed home (and the were married). Oh and by the way there is no such thing as FREE health care someone pays for it with money that came from someone else.

Right or wrong, it's like the old Jerry Butler song says: "Only The Strong Survive." The auto industry in the 1950's was a prime example. Ever hear of Hudson, Nash, Kaiser-Frazer, Studebaker, Packard, Willys, or Tucker? It wasn't that any of these folks put out a bad product; they just couldn't make money making the quality product they were known for. Plus, the big guys--Ford, GM, Chrysler--had enough money back then to put the squeeze on the small guys AND their suppliers. When push came to shove, the small guys just didn't have the clout. The guys in charge of Nash saw it coming when they merged with Hudson and set up an alliance with Packard; but for the most part, it was too little, too late for the little guys in the auto industry.

And so it is with small farmers. As much as I hate to bring it up, back in the late 1970's Lyndon LaRouche was telling us what was going to happen, with the agriculture industry being taken over by the big players like Cargill and ADM. LaRouche was portrayed as a crackpot, but in hindsight his predictions were pretty well on-the-money.

Look there is no "market"thats connected to supply and demand,its all rigged for the paper pushers and crooks.Working people dont matter in this crooked country,just crooks.

Just watch the movie.Some of the stuff Micheal Moore did was just as bad as the crooks.Yeah some of you all will just not watch it and run your mouth about it.If you do watch it,be prepared to get real mad.Maybe have somebody hide the keys to your gun case before you watch it.

I dont think you get what I meant.The "American Farmer"has been decieved.I am a little crazy,Ill even admit it.I grew up on a farm,and my brother still does farm.My last uncle that farmed died last month.I drove a tractor from the time I was 9 until I was 18.I have for the last 3 years helped farmers during harvest.I hauled food for 15 years.I hauled chickens from Mississippi to Minnesota more than one time,and lots of other places.I know what hard work is,and I know farming.When you wake up in a tractor trailer in a different place every day for 15 years,it tends to give you a little different feel for living than what most people have.With all the crap that goes on,thats why I am crazy.

Yes,true,but let's not just think that it means economically. How about the social end of it? As the rural communities shrink or disappear altogether,the "voluntary socialism" let's call it,becomes "government forced socialism". Have a natural disaster? What did we use to do? Neighbors helped neighbors. Gave of themselves. Now what do we do? Look for a TV camera,cry,blame the goverment and say "WHERE'S FEMA?"

How about todays kids? 4H,FFA vs street gangs. Constructive educational work at home vs video games,TV and soccer games. High School sports: small town rivelries,pride of your towns kids winning vs gang villence at inner city and cross town games.

It's not just Agriculture that determines where a country goes,it's the lifestyle that it represents.

I know what you mean.My ideas on a solution my be driven by being mad right now,I dont think my idea is even ever going to change,but I probably am wrong in my method to fix it,but I know Im right about it needing to be fixed at a minimum with 12 million farmers,probably should be 24 million.All the bigger is better was good for was the paper pushers.Who wants to set on a tractor day and night trying to put in 3 or 4 thousand acres and be too poor to hire a hand?There is a lot of deception going on.Once it sinks in you may want to do worse things than me to make things change.Im a fairly calm person most of the time.

I agree there.Every school class needs to have a field trip to a packing house to show them where hamburger comes from.

Like I said to Thurlow,I am a little crazy.My method to"fix"it may be a little off but I know whats wrong and what needs to be accomplished to fix it.Just might not want me making the decisions or running the show.In a country that I ran,sadistic as I would be,it would make people wish they were in a communist country.I just dont have any sympathy for crooks,or "educated"morons.If the country could stand what I proposed getting it back in shape,what with the firing squads and slave labor camps,in a couple of years what is still around might be a good country.It would be change you can count on for real!

The first and most important thing to "fix"all of this is to turn that trickle down of money to the working people into a downpour of money to the workers,or we should have some slowdowns and strike every industry.Most of them are gone anyway,if they try shipping stuff back in they made in China maybe it should get a big tarrif on it.Then if that doesnt stop it,we should give another company thats still in the USA the patent to what they are making and not allow their foreign product in here at all.If that doesnt work send the Air Force to China and drop a bomb on their factory.Lots of things could be done rather than throw our hands in the air and say its over.

I agree with most of that.Its not a point about free health care.Sure there is somebody paying for it.Also if you need a bridge to cross the Mississippi River,somebody paid for it.In comparison if you had to build a bridge across the Mississippi River,what would it look like compared to the one that lots of people helped pay for?Just imagine what the Mississippi river would look like after a while with everybody trying to build a bridge across it all the time?A mess wouldnt quite cover it.Medical care has turned into something like that.If government doesnt step in people will die because they cant afford health care even with insurance.Also what about all those people that could be fixed,but because an insurance company wont pay for the proceedure,die?The way things are now is not fair and has to be fixed.Its not a question if its free or not,its a question of if you can get it or not.In France doctors make house calls,thats why they are the best in the world as far as medical care.I dont know where you would have to drive from central Missouri here to find a good general practitioner doctor.None of the ones I know of are going to come to your house if you call them.Plus it is going to cost a minimum 100 dollars if you have to pay out of your pocket just to see a doctor at his office.We are being abused by the medical lobbying industry.Both sides of government are paid while we are given less medical care,which makes insurance companies rich.

Agriculture was the number one industry in PA the last time I checked.
An article in the newspaper the other day told how the people in one Twp. that moved out to the country, built their $300,000 houses, want the municipality, make the Amish clean the horse manure off the road way because they get it on their tires and it STINKS. Go figure.

I'd say your Farm Bureau friends took great liberty with Webster's words. He actually said this:

"When tillage begins, other arts follow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of human civilization."

So Daniel Webster was speaking of farmers as the pioneers of the nation, rather than a bellwether of society or the economy. Taken the context of the time, this makes sense: The nation was starting a huge westward expansion. As soon as farms were established, towns, roads, schools, government, etc. followed.

Now, to answer your question, which really has nothing to do with Webster, agriculture is certainly not the economic force it once was. We have become an urban society, and our economy has shifted. First to manufacturing, then to the financial sector. Now, with the collapse of both the manufacturing and finance sectors of the economy, agriculture may very well rise again to revitalize the US economy. Certainly agriculture accounts for a large portion of our exports, even though (I think) we are no longer a net exporter of agricultural products.