Farm Program Payment Limitations--Failure

I haven't paid attention to the farm program payment limitation issue in recent months. Senator Grassley's effort to save money by tighter limitations on farm program payments has failed:

"Grassley said he had difficulty getting a budget savings score from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) from his language to further reduce and modify farm program payment caps because CBO had difficulty tracing gains from generic certificates, as well as separate entities. 'There is no real system in place to track these payments,' Grassley said, adding that he had 'a problem with that' because 'there is no system to show where taxpayer dollars go' even though 'that was mandated in the 2002 Farm Bill.' Grassley said that legislation requires USDA to develop a system of tracking farm subsidy payments to people who benefit from them so there is no excuse. 'I am sending a letter to USDA asking Secretary Johanns to enforce Section 1614 of the farm bill so we know exactly who is benefiting from farm program payments,' Grassley said.

Asked why his latest effort on pay caps was defeated, Grassley acknowledged that farmers are currently getting large Loan Deficiency Payments (LDPs). A Minnesota banker has calculated that it only takes around 800 acres of corn to reach the $75,000 LDP cap this year (but generic certificates would allow producers an effective end around the actual LDP pay cap, but Grassley's proposed language would have repealed the use of generic certificates)."

The implication of the last paragraph is that, because more politicians have more of their constituents who might be hit by tighter rules, rather than just the usual cotton and rice people, it's a tougher fight.