Do PBS stations have parking lots?

I was watching PBS's "lexicon of sustainability" web video on land trusts and family farms, which is the idea of propping up doomed family farms with a one-time payment in exchange for legally blocking the land from most kinds of development, when the narrator said this will help save the farms from becoming "parking lots for corporate industrial parks."

Why is it whenever a family farm is at risk of being shut down, the land is always destined to become a parking lot? How come it's never a youth center, hospital, minority-owned business, public park, ethnic restaurant, hospice center, soccer field, church, solar array or, say, abortion clinic?

Maybe it's because family farms are cursed lands only suitable for dirty corporate uses, and no moral person has ever had trouble finding a place to park their vehicle.

Or, maybe it's because without shallow, emotional arguments the viewer would see how un-sustainable small family farms really are.
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Be careful what you wish for

Locavores, hipsters and foodies are learning that raising backyard chickens isn't as fun as they thought it would be, and many chickens only lay eggs for a few years but stay alive for a decade. This is leading to flocks of chickens being abandoned at animal shelters.

It’s the same scenario at the Chicken Run Rescue in Minneapolis, Minn., where owner Mary Britton Clouse has tracked a steady climb in surrendered birds from fewer than 50 in 2001 to nearly 500 in 2012. 

She traces that rise to the so-called “locavore” movement, which spiked in popularity in 2008 as advocates urged people to eat more food grown and processed close to home.  

 “It’s the stupid foodies,” said Britton Clouse, 60, who admits she speaks frankly. “We’re just sick to death of it.”  

 People entranced by a “misplaced rural nostalgia” are buying chickens from the same hatcheries that supply the nation's largest poultry producers and rearing them without proper space, food or veterinary care, she said.

Sorry kids, farming is hard work. Be careful what you wish for.
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Another knight for our round table

I just discovered the YouTube channel of Bailey Norwood, an agricultural economics professor at Oklahoma State University. He also takes in interest the economic arguments of the "Buy Local" movement

And man on man does he put them out to pasture.



I'm always interested in seeing what approach other people make when they tackle this issue. The "transfer of wealth" focus is a solid tactic, as a major trade fallacy is that wealth is being lost in exchange for nothing when people trade. In fact, the amount of wealth on average stays the same and it is the form of wealth that is exchanged.
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A bright student

Agricultural development economist Marc F. Bellemare Agricultur shares this great paragraph from a promising student. They both "get it."

Not only do these alternative food networks [Note: Fair Trade, local, organic, etc. -- MFB.] often have high price barriers, they also give rise to a hierarchy among consumers. Those who can afford ethical products are at the top, and cash-strapped families with no other option but to buy generic, mass-produced groceries are seen as morally inferior. Not only can lower-income families not afford these higher quality goods for their personal use, they are also morally chastised for their purchases. Lower class incomes do not enable an expression of values orientated towards a sustainable, fair food production system, however few other forms of activism are available to these communities. Lower class families are victimized both economically and morally for “choices” that arise merely out of economic need. Such a hierarchy ignores questions of access and champions individuals who are already members of an elite, privileged community.

I just need to add: The issue becomes more absurd when one learns these expensive food products do not actually accomplish the ends the supporters have for them. In the case of organic and locally-produced food the elitist methods are counter productive, causing more environmental harm than conventional means.
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All hail quinoa, slayer of poverty

It looks like the poor farmers in Bolivia and Peru are seeing some decent profits because of growing demand and exports of the food crop quinoa. This has lead to major improvements in the standard of living for poor people in these countries.

Like clockwork, rich busybodies from Western nations feel they have to put a stop to this. As know-nothing foodist Joanna Blythman writes in The Guardian, this increased demand has lead to an increase in the domestic price of quinoa.

The appetite of countries such as ours for this grain has pushed up prices to such an extent that poorer people in Peru and Bolivia, for whom it was once a nourishing staple food, can no longer afford to eat it. Imported junk food is cheaper. In Lima, quinoa now costs more than chicken. Outside the cities, and fuelled by overseas demand, the pressure is on to turn land that once produced a portfolio of diverse crops into quinoa monoculture.

Note the scare word "monoculture." Blythman, who spends a considerable amount of time railing against genetically modified food and other forms of progress, leaves out that rice is still plentiful and costs a fourth of the price of quinoa. It's true that some people in Peru and Bolivia are now eating things like pizza and pasta, but it's not the poor. It's the middle class, and they are eating it because they prefer it and can finally afford it.

Thus, it's clear her biggest problem with quinoa is that it makes poor people wealthy. She would rather live in a world where impoverished serfs toil in the fields all day and sleep on dirt floors than let Bolivian farmers send their kids to school because they might try to bring a cupcake for a snack. Don't mistake her stance as ethical, it's downright cruel.
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Malawi's failed local corn growing policies

Tyler Cowen recently posted this video detailing the flaws in Malawi's corn policies, which restrict the import and export of corn.



As of a result of locavore-style food production policies, we see extreme volatility in corn prices, about 60 percent, from the harvest season to just before next year's harvest season when corn is scarce.

This is what happens when your food supply is restricted to the local area's climate. Imagine if there was a natural disaster that ruined the harvest in one year. This is the polar opposite of making the food supply more secure. 

Instead of hedging with the world's food supply, Malawi's corn supply depends on the whim of chance and as a result, corn becomes scarce each and every year.
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Cowen on eliminating agricultural subsidies

I'm a sucker for a good anti-agricultural subsidy remark. Here's what Tyler Cowen had to say in a recent reader-submitted Freakonomics Q&A:

Q. Let’s say the ~$20B in U.S. subsidies for corn wheat, rice, soybeans, dairy, etc. are gradually dialed down to $0 in the next 10 years. What do you think the impact on food would be ? Would prices rise? Would flavor and health improve?<

A. Eliminating agricultural subsidies would improve the federal budget and the long-term fiscal outlook. There is no reason not to do it.

That said, sometimes foodies overemphasize how much those subsidies skew the world of food. Many of the bad sides of our corporate food world would still remain, or be virtually as prominent, though only customers would have to pay for them. We will still have too much corn syrup in our diets, and too many fruits and vegetables without much real taste and too much processed food.

Some agricultural subsidies make food more expensive, such as when they are combined with price floors, other subsidies make it cheaper, or lead to a distribution of surplus abroad, keeping food off the home market but boosting the amount of aid. The overall effects of agricultural subsidies on food prices are quite complex.

How many times have we all heard someone criticize agricultural subsidies, but before we could bring our hands together to applaud, the speaker went on the say the only problem with them is they are going to the wrong farmers.


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You don't eat public goods

If I was going to pick the capital of fresh, plausible economic ideas, I would not pick Seattle and I fear its residents are on a quest to cement that position.

Local groups are spending six figures on the Beacon Food Forest. A food forest is a sort of garden. They are usually private, but in this case the public is supposed to walk in and gather free food, from pears to blueberries, right off the plant.

The obvious question is, how will they deal with the tragedy of the commons? According to NPR, their solution is wishful thinking.

Of course, any "free" food source begs the question of what to do with overzealous pickers. No definitive answer on how to handle that predicament has been established yet, though. According to Herlihy, the only solutions right now are to produce an abundance of fruit so there's enough for everyone and to embed "thieves' gardens" with extra plants in the park for those people eager to take more than their share.

Seattle has a population of about 609,000 people. This project is going to be on seven acres of land. There's going to be a supply issue, and I somehow doubt the locavores are willing to use genetically-modified plants or chemical fertilizers to increase the yield.

The major problem here is very simple. These groups are attempting to use public and private money to create a public good for everyone to enjoy. Public goods can be very helpful to society, but they always follow two basic characteristics: They must be non-excludable and non-rivalrous.

The Beacon Food Forest will not be excludable. Anyone can walk in and use it any time they want. This is how public projects are supposed to work.

However, eating food is always rivalrous, that is, when some people use it, other people can't. You can't have rivalrous items as public goods, there's no way around it.

You don't have to know the textbook definition of these terms to see how poorly this will end. Volunteers will need to tend the crops, and any tourist can take them away. They could always put up gates and limit who comes in, which would require ongoing labor and radically change the nature of the project, but there's no way to make food non-rivalrous. This is a real problem that needs to be addressed, and it doesn't look like they're taking it seriously.

There is, however, one possible solution that could tone down the problem. Following Elinor Ostrom's work on how informal groups can enforce property rights with social pressures, it's possible that Seattle will develop some kind of public shaming system to punish pilferers.

Here's my idea: Post signs saying the forest garden is public property and by entering you consent to being filmed and photographed. Establish a photo blog that captures everyone who leaves with food, as well as everyone who contributes work to the area, and let readers spot those who frequently take and never give.

Even if they do stumble across a systematic shaming technique, this still doesn't address the issue that food grows slowly and people eat often. Expect to see a lot of bare branches and trampled bushes once this thing gets going. I think there will be such a rush to take food before someone else does that a lot of people will end up eating unripened plants. I don't know if enthusiasm for the project can be sustained enough to get volunteers to maintain the place, but the biggest problem will always be volume. There's no way the supply will keep up with the demand.
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Deregulate local food

How bad can a situation be for local food advocates when critics like me have to come to their side?

Here's a typical example. In November the Quail Hollow Farm in Nevada hosted a five-course meal and the owners say they met all the standards they were told ahead of time, but then the health department waited for the event to start before they cited additional unmet requests and destroyed the food.



My niche for this blog has been to provide a reality check to the buy local movement. I mostly write about the pseudo scientific economic selling points, but I occasionally branch out to the phony environmental and health claims. Quail Hollow Farm is guilty of these too. These advocates make plenty of other fictional claims like "fresh locally-grown fruits and vegetables are indispensable for optimal nutrition and health" on their list of core values, but none of this has anything to do with the awful health regulations the government enforces.

The slow wheels of government has not caught up to this cottage industry of local food advocates. While I disagree with their motives and values, I feel sickened to see their consumer choices being thwarted by government officials allegedly out of paternalistic concern. It's much easier to create government restrictions than remove them, and these locavores are paying the price for bad legislation.

People on the left seem to have a knee-jerk response to the idea of deregulation. Let this example shine through to that logic. While regulation is needed in some very specific areas, we should never assume that our current level of regulation is optimal. It's easy to image a dangerous over-regulated situation, and we should always be open to arguments to remove or add additional regulations.

There's something very wrong with assuming all food is considered poison until proven otherwise, and anyone should be able to recognize that. I'm glad to see the locavores carrying that torch.
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Congress can't stop subsidizing the rich

There's a little econ riddle I like to ask people to plant a thought in their brain: Say a sweater costs $10 at a store, and the government wants to decide between putting a $10 tax on the merchant who sells that sweater, or the customer who buys it. What is the difference?

The answer is, there is no difference. Those policies will switch who "writes the check" for the tax, but it will not change who actually pays the tax. It's the same thing with the illusion that employers pay half of social security.

So turning that metaphor around from taxes to subsidies, a recent Marginal Revolution post from Alex Tabarrok got me thinking about who a subsidy really goes to.

Farm subsidies are the perfect example of corporate welfare. They are big checks given to rich corporations that let them sell their product cheaper. My friends on the left can easily relate when I tell them why I oppose farm subsidies.

But what if instead we sent cards out to consumers that let them get a discount for the American food that purchased. When that happens, some people jump ship to support that program. I can understand why when the checks are only written to the poor, but sometimes they're written to everyone.

The USDA's "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food" program gives loans and grants to "local food producers," but since this is an unproductive, needlessly expensive way to produce food, and the product they make costs more, isn't this simply subsidizing the rich?

What's next, subsidizing opera tickets? Don't worry, we already do that.

The Trabarrok posts says that the Republicans are cutting some food aid, where the check is written to the poor, but keeping a ton of the farm subsidies intact, where the check is written to the rich. This is the worst way to go about this.

Interesting point from Trabarrok at the end. We love our agricultural subsidies so much, when the World Trade Organization told us to stop paying $147 million each year to the American cotton industry, or give the same amount to Brazil's cotton industry (and the customers of that industry), our leaders chose to double down instead of leading the table.

What an absolute mess.
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