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| The Big Begging Bowl | |
The latest piece of idiocy to come out of the Earth Summit is the claim by
poorer nations that the US is
keeping them poor by subsidizing US food production. Apparently the US policy
of taxing their own citizens to
subsidize their food
producers causes global food prices to drop and causes other nations to go
hungry. But nations are either net food exporters or net
food importers. If they are net food exporters and their own people are
going hungry, one has to question why. If they kept the food to
feed their own people, instead of trying to sell it at US-deflated
world-market prices they wouldn't be so hungry. If they are net food importers they can hardly be worse
off by the US offering to sell them food for less than it takes
to produce it. It is only rich countries like Australia which are
disadvantaged by the US self-destructive subsidization idiocy. Australia is
also a net exporter of food, and loses money due to the low world
market prices. But the truth never stood in the way of a good story at UN whine-sessions. Just
another example of squishy-logic designed to draw attention away from the real
reason these countries are poor - corruption, government incompetence and
lack of secure private ownership. Rarely do they explore a topic that is so black-and-white.
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