A Different Perspective--Rebanks

 James Rebanks is a skilled writer whose book I enjoyed.  He's got a new book for sale, already released in the UK and now in the US on August 3.

I haven't read the new book, but anticipate I will, likely from the library. Civil Eats has an excerpt from it, describing his visit to Wendell Berry in Kentucky and to Iowa.

While he calls Iowa farmers the "best farmers that ever lived", he doesn't like our production agriculture, mourning the transition we've made over the last 60 years or so.

I agree with him there have been big tradeoffs, but I'm not as negative as he is about current agriculture.  I don't know how well his sheep farm could support his family without, I'm guessing, significant support from his writing.  

But he's worth reading. 

Missing Somethings in Schelling: Reston Verus Prince George

Thomas Schelling was a great economist, who won the Nobel.  One book had this: In 1969 and 1971, Schelling published widely cited articles dealing with racial dynamics and what he termed "a general theory of tipping."^[21] In these papers he showed that a preference that one's neighbors be of the same color, or even a preference for a mixture "up to some limit," could lead to total segregation,

I think generally it was taken as explaining why "block-busting" in the 60's led to a change from lily-white ownership to all-black ownership--whites had a preference for living among whites. But when you look at what he said, at least as summarized in Wikipedia, it's race-blind.  In other words, blacks could have a preference for living among blacks, which could also affect housing patterns.  That point was, I think, missed because we didn't have a real world example. 

One factor in the discussion is the starting point.  In the 1960's you had areas which were inhabited by one race. Another factor is whether you think it's a "preference", or whether it's an emergent property from network effects: you buy where a friend has bought first, "Networks" has become a new buzzword for analysis.  And these days we're more familiar with "chain" immigration, where a neighborhood in the US is peopled mostly by immigrants from one town in Mexico, or wherever. .  

I bought in Reston in the mid-70's, partly because it was founded from the beginning as equal opportunity housing.  I was part of an outflow of people from DC moving out to the suburbs.  As it turned out, despite Reston's open appeal, it didn't attract a lot of blacks--I don't think it's ever gotten much over 10 percent blacks--; most blacks moving from the District went to Prince George County, which is now majority black.  These patterns fit Schelling's analysis, but how much of the underlying cause is preference, and how much is network effects is still unknown. 

Seat Belts and Air Bags

 To me the argument for using seat belts in an air bag equipped car is the same as for using a face mask when vacinated. 

Carbon Credits and Bureaucracy

 A number of articles on the issue of carbon credits--Politico, Civil Eats Modern Farmer, and others.  Apparently the Biden administration is moving towards a system of establishing credits for farmers to capture carbon in the soil as part of the effort to minimize climate change.  There's questions about definitions, about recognizing existing practices which capture carbon, etc. etc.

What strikes me is the likely impact on the USDA bureaucracy.  I assume NRCS will be the lead agency in determining whether a given practice captures carbon, etc. and that data relating to credits will be tied into the GIS system.

I've not studied the issue, but I'm assuming the credits will have monetary value, small at first but increasing.  I assume there might be a tie to existing farm programs.  Consider the sod/swamp provisions which initiated in the 1985 farm bill with some programs over the years requiring compliance with the provisions as a condition of eligibility for payments.  It's easy enough to imagine a requirement for some minimum of carbon capture being added to sod/swamp. I'm not sure these days how the FSA-NRCS collaboration on sod/swamp is working, but carbon capture might put new strains on the relationship, as well as the joint management of GIS data.

During my time NRCS had programs with their responsibilities under sod/swamp because they weren't used to being the "bad guy", making decisions which hurt farmers.  The agency's culture was always being the good guy, teaching and helping farmers to do better.  Will NRCS be up for carbon capture decisions?

A final concern is fraud.  We like to believe producers are honest, and most are.  But some aren't, and it's easy enough to imagine a fraudulent collaboration between a farmer and a USDA employee.

[Updated to add a link.]

FSA and the Last Mile Problem

 Sec. Vilsack is announcing additional programs to aid producers impacted by the pandemic.

My impression of the various programs which have authorized spending in response to the pandemic and its effect is that several of them have had big problems in getting the money out the door.  Some of the programs have struggled to get the money out; others have perhaps been vulnerable to fraud.  

Those are impressions only.  Meanwhile I'm following the FSA employee group on Facebook. I likely suffer from the old-timer's presumption that the newcomers have it easier, but I try to resist that snap judgment.  On the one hand, I'm very impressed by the variety of programs, some directed to people FSA has long served, some directed to new groups, which the counties have had to deal with.  On the other hand I remember PIK in 1983 and particulary the disaster program in 1986 (IIRC) which hit in the midst of the System/36 automation. 

I hope someday somebody, GAO or Congress, does a high level review of the government's operations, their speed, efficiency, and weaknesses.  My expectation and hope is that FSA would do well in such a review, largely because of a long history in dealing with crash programs and, most importantly, the county offices deal directly with the people, a big contrast with most of the rest of government which has to try to operate through state and county government agencies, and/or NGOs.

The Limits of Small Farms

Civil Eats has this piece on Jesse Frost, who operates a .75 acre no-till farm in Kentucky.

It all sounds good, except when he says his operation grosses $70K, and apparently uses 2+ person-years of labor--i.e., one paid employee and Jesse full time, and some contribution from his wife. 

I can accept that his out-of-pocket expenses, assuming he owns the land outright with no mortgage,  are low.  But $70K divided by 2 is $35K each, which isn't much over the minimum wage progressives would like to see.  I can also accept that food costs for his wife and him would be relatively low, especially if they freeze and/or can a lot. But I'm not convinced that the cash returns are sufficient for a lifetime supporting a family through all the ups and downs.  It may well be enough with the wife's outside income, likely providing health insurance and covering SS. 

Migrating to Opportunity

 David Brooks has an column in today's NYTimes on the question: "How racist is America?" His answer seems to be--getting less so, when you look at long range changes.  I recommend it.

But he had an observation about how immigrants are doing better than you might expect, particularly if you focus on prejudice against foreigners.  He noted that immigrants move to places of opportunity.  The implication is it gives them an advantage over native-born, who tend to live where they grew up, or at least some natives are less mobile.  You can pick holes in such a generalization: for example the Amish are notably mobile, and people flocked to North Dakota during the oil boom. 

But I buy it. By moving from one country to another you break a lot of the habits and constraints you'd have if you remained.  That's true for the vast majority of movers.  But the majority of Americans aren't moving, even within the country.

I think it's true that our mobility has decreased over the years.  I think a minor factor is the end of the draft, which broke some of the ties men had.  (Though as a creature of habit myself I may be overestimating their role in life.)

More Metaphors--Wet Wood and Poison

 I posted earlier on nuclear reactions as a metaphor possibly explaining the rise in murders recently.  The key point is the reactivity--when the population becomes younger for whatever reason (baby boom, oldsters observing lockdowns, oldsters dying from covid) the interactions among people change a bit without the cushioning effect of the older.   A similar logic could apply to the pandemic--as more people are vaccinated, the reactivity goes down.

I came across a new metaphor today in a discussion of the effects of the vaccine.  The metaphor is wood, as in forest fires.  If the wood is very dry it catches fire easily, if there's been rain it doesn't. From that perspective the vaccine has the effect of dampening the wood.

A separate metaphor was poison--in a Post story explaining vaccination, the point is that the vaccine isn't binary, like shutting the door on the virus.  It's more like a poison.  So when the body is infected, the virus attacks and is multiplying, but then it starts to encounter the poison (as the immune system ramps up).  The virus starts to be poisoned, reducing its reproduction rate.  So testing may give a positive test during the time the virus is in its struggle with the immune system, as hopefully it's in its death throes.

China and Farmland

 Once again people are getting upset by the idea of citizens of a rising Asian power buying American farmland. See this and this.

As I blogged previously, this is an old story. Back in the 1970's Congress passed  AFIDA, but back then it wasn't China which was the perceived threat.  China was a poor backwards country struggling under communism.  Instead it was Japan, which was selling us cars, not electronics, and using a few of the dollars they got to buy real estate, some agricultural land, some urban properties including Rockefeller Center.

In the long run who owns what is determined by economics.  Japan's star has faded, China's risen.  In the next 30 years it may be India or Nigeria which has the money to buy some land.  

Nation Building--Napoleon, Ataturk, Kagame, Petraeus

 Reading "The Fourth Star" by David Cloud and Greg Jaffe, which deals with the interwining careers of Generals Casey, Abizaid, Chiarelli, and Petraeus, who all were associated with the Iraq war.  So far I'm up to roughly 2004, when Petraeus has left the 101st Airborne for the States, then returned to Iraq to train the new Iraqi army.  During the division's occupation of Mosul in the north of Iraq Petraeus was a forceful presence in nation-building, or at least patching together a semi-operational local government.  

We all know the results of our involvement there.  

I got to thinking about leaders who were successful in nation-building: Napoleon's imprint on France is present today, as is Ataturk's on Turkey. Kagame's rule of Rwanda has now lasted longer than either of the foregoing and looks to be as impactful.

As best I can tell, Petraeus has a comparable big personality and intelligence as the other three, so what accounts for his failure and the success of the other three?

The obvious thing is longevity, which points to a big weakness in American nation-building efforts: rotation.  As a democracy we don't feel able to tell our generals and our troops you're in for the duration. We rotate them out after a year or so.  I wonder what would have happened if the troops who had 3 to 5 tours of duty in Afghanistan or Iraq had instead spent 3 years (with R&R) in the same area. Perhaps more importantly, if our generals had spent that time.

I'm reminded of a lesson Bob Reynolds, who was then the deputy director of the Administrative Services Division, ASCS gave me when I screwed up. It was to the effect that people, employees, cared more about consistency than charm; you can figure out how to deal with someone who's the same asshole every day, but dealing with someone who's different every day is much more difficult.

I think that's true with nation building.  Petraeus may not have had the right ideas, but he was forceful.  Reminds me of old corncob pipe Dougie, our near-fascist general, Douglas MacArthur,  who lasted 6 years in a nation building exercise which was very successful, much as I hate to admit it.