Iowa Farmers Are Old--So It's Always Been

 A quote from  Chris Jones, an Iowa environmental engineer (doing a demographic analysis of Iowa farmers,

Of these white folks, 80% are male and the average age is almost as old as I am: 58.9 years

He's fighting Iowa CAFO's polluting water, with facts and complaints. A good cause, but I picked out this factoid to comment on. 

I remember in Infoshare Sherman County, Kansas was one of the trial counties for providing on-line access for farmers to some of the data USDA agencies had for them.  Mike Sherman, then the CED, had some data on the average age of his farmers--somewhere in the 50's IIRC. A problem then, a small part of the problem, was the older farmers generally weren't into computers, so what we were trying to do had no appeal.  

But to my title--I suspect if we had data going back to the Revolution on the age distribution of farmers we'd find they were consistently older than most working Americans.  Why? Because since the Revolution the proportion of US workers engaged in agriculture has been declining, sometimes fast, sometimes slowly. That means some farm children left the farm for the city, while their parents stayed on the farm, thereby skewing the age distribution. 

Was It Push or Pull--Leaving the Farm

 I read a paragraph like this, and it triggers me:

Agroecology is at a crossroads. The farming system—which is primarily practiced in the developing world but is gaining some traction in the U.S.—incorporates a suite of ecological growing practices into a wider philosophy rooted in shifting power from global agribusiness companies to peasant farmers.

The assumption behind it is that the "peasant farmer" way of life is preferable to any other.  The further assumption is that big companies push farmers off their land. But what if the way of life available off the farm is, on the whole, what one prefers?

I retain some affection for farming as it was in the 1940's and 50's. There were good times and good memories.  There were also downsides, and for me, a misfit between me and the possibilities of the style.  Part of that was the advance of "production agriculture", to use a relatively neutral name for market-oriented farming, with increasing investments required to compete.  So I was pushed. 

But in my case, it was mostly pull.  And I think over the course of history there's been more pull than push. To say otherwise is, in part, the romanticism of the liberal/progressive left.

Under Recorded: Luck and Power

 I think there's a gap in both journalism and history; we don't do enough to recognize the role that luck and power (differentials) play in human affairs.

Determining who has the power, and why, is often a better way to analyze things than alternatives such as racism, etc.  And looking at the effects of power differentials on the holders of power and the the subjects of power is as important.  Lord Acton's " Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely" is a favorite.

It's possible to determine the powerful and those who have to cope with the powerful, but much harder to determine the lucky.   Just finished the bio on James Baker.  The authors note the ways he was lucky in his rise to prominence.  I don't know of any rules or analysis of the subject though.

Changing Our First Responders

Just saw an interview on Ananpour with Danielle Allen talking about policing, etc. Wasn't paying that much attention, but caught her mentioning changing our first responders.  That seems to be a popular liberal interpretation of "defund the police"--where currently police are our first responders for 911 calls (at least that's our perception, the EMTs and fire might disagree), a "generalist" model, instead we should separate different types of problems and have "specialists" for each.  For example, social workers, social psychologists, traffic wardens, etc.  

The logic is that police, being armed, resort too often to violence where a softer, gentler approach would avoid the tragedies.

I like the idea, but my contrarian streak also offers a caution"

America is a heavily-armed society. If a jurisdiction is able to set up such a system, the likelihood is sometime they will have one of their "specialists" will be killed by someone with a gun (or knife). When that happens, there will be a popular uproar and demands to arm the specialists, or shift responsibility back towards the police.

There's always tradeoffs.  TANSTAAFL 

Policing--a Modest Suggestion

 Saw a piece on police training in the US today, somewhere.  Apparently there are several problems: with 18,000 organizations there's no uniformity (and no national database to record bad cops); training in the US is a lot shorter than in Europe; the training they get doesn't cover some of the key issues.  Another problem is lack of money--the emphasis is getting bodies on the street.

All this leads me to this suggestion:

• provide federal money to local police force
• make the money available only to expand the training and cover some of the missing areas
• record those who receive federally funded training in a database, and track their careers--do they do better than their peers/predecessors, etc. Publicize the results, presumably good, to pressure the organizations which don't take advantage of the money.

Rural Broadband--in Vermont per Walt Jeffries

 Walt Jeffries at Sugar Mountain Farm has been a very quiet blogger for a good while, and it's been even longer since I blogged about him.  (I'm sure I did, but too lazy to check.) He and his family have pigs, plus other livestock, on a farm in Vermont. 

He ceased right after he had gotten the necessary inspections to butcher their hogs on the farm and sell the meat across state lines, as well as within Vermont.  Building the butcher shop had been a multi-year endeavor, chronicled in the blog. After that he may have had less material to use in the blog.  Don't know.  I also thought maybe his children might have had problems with his blogging as they grew to adulthood, which would explain his silence.

Anyhow, he's recently returned to blogging, at least a little. His latest post reports the approach of fiber optic cable to his farm. He might go with that way, as opposed to Musk's Starlink system.  He credits the USDA broadband effort.  That's interesting because he's basically a libertarian type, reluctantly dealing with the regulations needed to get his butcher shop and retail sales operation running.

On Chauvin--Changing the Parameters

 Mr. Chauvin was convicted yesterday.  I've not tried to follow the ins and outs, but based on what I've heard/read I've no problem with it.  Scott Johnson at Powerline says the prosecution case was stronger than his initial expectations, which is significant.

If I could, I'd like to gather people on both sides of the verdict and ask this question: if the parameters of the case could be changed, what change(s) would convince you to change your mind? By parameters I mean such things as the length of time Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck, Floyd's actions, the prosecution witnesses, Floyd's health condition (Bob Somerby has a hypothetical there.)

While the exercise would be interesting, I don't know if it would be educational at all.  I don't think people make decisions that way, by considering parameters one at a time.  It's like buying a house; the final choice is more a gut feel than reasoned.

Things Changing Faster Than You Notice

 Calculated Risk reports: 

Currently, almost 61 million people in the U.S. labor force have a Bachelor's degree or higher. This is almost 44% of the labor force, up from 26.2% in 1992.

When my father graduated from U of Minnesota in 1912 he was one of about 2 percent of the people in the US with a bachelor's degree. 

Tax Reform

 Reading "The Man Who Ran Washington, the Life and Times of James A. Baker III"

On page 250 Baker, who's just moved from chief of staff to Reagan to be Secretary of Treasury is about to work on tax reform.  The authors describe the current situation in terms which sound familiar today: many big corporations not paying any taxes, effective tax rate low, multitude of loopholes etc. 

As they describe the eventual 1986 tax reform act, it almost sounds as if it's something Biden could buy.  Top rate 33 percent (using a surtax) with 35 percent on corporations.  Eventually passed comfortably with bipartisan support. 

Times have changed.

The Return of Plain English Regulations

 Not sure what this tells me, except I'm old, as if the mirror doesn't remind me daily.

Back in my ASCS Directives Management days, my branch was responsible for processing ASCS and CCC regulations to the Office of Federal Regulations.  We had to ensure proper format, conformed (carbon) copies, official signatures, the correct set of documents (i.e., the regulation itself, the transmittal memo, and others). The regulation package would circulate among the offices in a special folder, with the routing sheet stapled to the front, ending up with the Administrator, ASCS or Executive VP, CCC as applicable.

Among the many goals of President Carter  were several aiming to improve the federal government (notably Senior Executive Service and the sunset law). Theoretically of similar importance was the "plain English" initiative.  Regulation writers got some classes in how to write, and agencies got instructions for their heads to certify that regulations were written in "plain English".  In reality, all that meant after the first few months was the addition of another document with multiple copies to be included in the regulation folder.  The document just read something like": "I certify the enclosed regulation is written in plain English".

I think the Reagan administration may have continued the requirement, at least for a whole, but it didn't last much longer than that.

But it's back!! Govtrack.us has an article with a title which tells us all: 

Providing Accountability Through Transparency Act would require 100-word plain English summaries of each new federal rule or regulation

 It's been introduced in both House and Senate, but no co-sponsors as yet.  Cynically I want to note that where Carter wanted the whole regulation to be in plain English, so far this effort is just to have a short summary in plain English, leaving the actual regulation to be inscrutable, or not, depending on the ability of the regulation writer and the environment in which she is working.