Can
NEWARK, Del. Family farms
can be as efficient as larger ones,
but because of current economic
pressure they’re rapidly disap
pearing. The 1980 s could well be
the decade of decision for the
family farm.
“Study after study points to U.S.
tax policies as a chief cause of the
family farm’s decline,” says
University of Delaware extension
farm policy specialist Gerald F.
Vaughn. “Current tax provisions
favor larger farmers and wealthy
investors. You can’t blame a
taxpayer in any bracket for using
available tax advantages, but the
present system enables high
bracket farm owners to convert
their before-tax losses to after-tax
profits, at commodity price levels
that put lower-bracket farmers out
of business.”
If family fanning is to survive
and thrive, Vaughn believes U.S.
tax policies must be corrected.
“Without unbiased tax policies,”
he says, “the upcoming 1985 Food
and Agriculture Act and other
measures can do little to save
family farming.”
Policy observers also are con
cerned about American
agriculture’s recurring instability,
which is caused by heavy
dependence on unreliable foreign
trade, wide annual fluctuations in
farm production and prices, dim
outlook for commodity price im
provement (at least in the short
run), and the trend toward fewer
and larger farms.
“This instability may warrant a
1985 Farm Bill aimed at reducing
price variability and stabilizing,
Commodity papers available
NEWARK, Del. Background
papers are now available on each
of the 14 farm commodities for
which federal price and income
support programs are in operation.
According to University of
Delaware extension farm policy
specialist Gerald F. Vaughn,
farmers on Delmarva should find
the papers on com, soybeans,
dairy, wheat, barley and oats of
particular interest. Other papers
deal with honey, sorghum,
peanuts, tobacco, rice, cotton, wool
and mohair, and sugar.
Free single copies of these
commodity background papers are
available from: Gerald F. Vaughn,
Cooperative Extension Service,
University of Delaware, Newark,
DE 19717-1303. When writing
please specify the commodity (ies)
of interest.
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rather than increasing, farm in- and may change substantially. The
come,” Vaughn says. “Taxpayers pik experience showed how in
and federal budget planners are capable the 1981 farm law was of
not inclined to support a new round dealing with such changes.”
of expensive farm programs.” Vaughn hopes drafters of the
Four-year farm legislation 1935 Farm Bill will make it as
usually has been written to fit flexible as possible. He believes it
conditions which exist when a bill should authorize the widest
is drafted. This ignores the possible range of options, so that
inherent instability of agriculture, federal programs can respond
the specialist says. “Conditions in more quickly and effectively to
agriculture seldom remain un- changing needs than they have in
changed during the four-year span the past. “Flexibility and quick
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response are critical to achieving acreage allotments and/or
greater economic stability in marketing quotas on themselves.”
farming,” he says. To sustain agriculture, the
Along this line, he feels the new specialist urges three priorities for
bill should include authority for farm policy:
supply management. “If farm * Stronger measures to aid
commodities are to have a steady family farming, including
and dependable flow into domestic correction of U.S. tax policies.
and world markets without * Measures to stabilize farm
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