Race, Class, and Organic

Tom Philpott notes, from his attendance at a California eco-farming conference:

And yet, sustainable-ag remains a passion limited largely to white, middle-class folks. Eco-Farm displayed a broad diversity of ages and sartorial styles. Ethnically, though, a kind of monoculture flourished. That fact was seldom mentioned; and only with a dose of self-flagellation. What was missing, though, was analysis. Why are so few non-whites drawn to small-scale farming? I never heard the question come up. Like the national food-justice movement, the California contingent has failed to open a broad and sustained conversation on food, class, and race. Indeed, the whole question was essentially relegated to a single informative session on urban farming. I think the vexations of food and class will have to be fully aired and addressed for the sustainable-food movement to move beyond niche status. But the lack of discussion at Eco-Farm doesn't mean there isn't plenty of powerful activism around food in low-income, minority-dominated areas in California. In the next days, I plan to visit and post about San Francisco's Alemany Farm and Oakland's People's Grocery.

Why doesn't it work for Latinos and African-Americans? Money. Eating local, eating organic is the sort of crunchy life-style choice that made by people who have it made. Not to say that it's only rich people, but it's people who aren't striving to make it, to put kids through college, to advance a rung up the ladder. In Thorsten Veblen's terms, it's another form of conspicuous consumption. It's the people who can afford to be skinny, to devote their life to art, who seem to gravitate to this.

John Phipps Counsels Moderation

John Phipps comments:

We're going to need another justification than "cheap food" to continue our subsidies with farm income for many growers at record levels. When disposable income stagnates with slow growth, our oft-repeated statistic about "less of their income" could shoot up significantly, revealing it is 90% about income and 10% about commodity prices.

Grain farmers are also going to have to contend with increasingly restive livestock producers.

I think payment limits and means-testing would be a strategic compromise to consider right now. Ya gotta know when to fold 'em.

Complexity in Politics

Shankar Vedantam has an article discussing research on state of the union addresses. They tend to be more complex in the first 3 years of a presidential term, and less so in the 4th year/re-election cycle. The argument is that the public likes its liquor straight and its politics simple, unmixed with qualifications or cautions. So when a president is running for office he/she keeps things simple, when governing he/she acknowledges more complexity.

It's interesting, though it fits my preconceptions a bit neatly.

Bud Light + Honda = Ivy League Economist

Maybe I should return to my alma mater--Bob Frank's Crib

Robots, Assembly LInes, and Dairies

I know robots have been operating on assembly lines for a long time, but I wasn't aware that robots fit the smaller (sic) dairies. According to this article, from Better FArming, they do. A note of reassurance--you have to love your cows for it to work, just getting a robot because you hate the work is a route to failure.

Organic and Labor--Economics of Farming

From a Tom Philpott piece on an organic conference and a presentation by Eric Schlosser (reference tomato pickers and Burger King):

While he treated his audience with great respect -- and won enthusiastic applause in response --Schlosser didn't let the assembled growers off the hook. He noted that organic standards make no stipulations about how growers treat workers. For him, he added, organic means nothing if workers are systematically mistreated. His remark must have caused some unease (though the cheering audience didn't show it). As my friend Bonnie Powell of Ethicurean writes in her account of Schlosser's speech, "labor is an Achilles-heel issue for many organic farmers." Bonnie reminds us that:

A 2005 report published by researchers at UC Davis found that of 188 California organic farms surveyed, a majority failed to pay a living wage or provide medical or retirement plans.

There's nothing easy about that issue. As I wrote when the UC Davis study came out, organic farming is so labor-intensive, and its profit margins remain so low, that most small- and mid-sized growers would probably go out of business if they paid a decent wage.

That's the economics of farming--the farmer cannot price his or her output, so the premium is on reducing costs. How? By mechanizing and rationalizing (aka "industrializing") and paying labor poorly. The return in farming is on capital, i.e., land, not labor.

Unintended Consequences

One of the standard ways to criticize government is to point out the unintended consequences of laws or regulations. Freakonomics has a good piece here. Alex Tabarrok at Marginal Revolution has commentary here .The commenters have gone to town.

However, the same truth applies for all human actions, including those by corporate bodies. I think the law is a subset of the generalization: "people aren't as smart as they think they are".

When Is a Bubble Not a Bubble?

I've taken the position that farm prices will dive as they have done in the past. The counter position is that the new market for corn for ethanol, which has the side effect of driving up soybean prices, changes economic fundamentals.

Bruce Babcock, as summarized here, seems to agree with me.

I'd add, in view of the last few days, a widespread economic slowdown means a softer market for feed grains (remember the Asian recession of the late 90's). It also means lower oil prices, which means less of a bonus for ethanol. Finally, I noticed somewhere the idea that Russians found US-made farm machinery very good. That's a turnaround from the 90's, when Russian tractors were being sold in the U.S. But more importantly, it means that Russian farmers have the money to invest in modern machinery, which means more production there.

National Animal ID System

I've great faith in the ability of people to be paranoid. So I can't wait for the opposition to the National Animal ID System (NAIS) to merge with the opposition to gun registration laws and to Real ID.

It's all the Mark of the Beast, isn't it?

Of course, logically they should all merge with the pro-choice forces in supporting a right of privacy in the Constitution for guns, animals, and people.

Lincoln's Doctor's Dog

Is supposedly the title of a hypothetical bestseller (people like books on Lincoln, on medicine, and on pets). We like pets, period. This Science Daily article is interesting, but I'm not sure I understand it.

Lonely people are more apt to see human traits in pets than non-lonely people? Okay, I can buy that.

Lonely people are more apt to believe in the supernatural? (Not sure whether that's God or UFO's or what). Maybe.

People who aren't lonely are less likely to see human traits in people who are outside their sphere?
??