Assignment:
The general population seems to be under the perception that farm subsidies are good; however, after a bit of reading it seems that government subsides only benefit big farm businesses. According to The Balance, subsidies act like a regressive tax that helps high-income businesses, not poor rural farmers. It appears in fact, the primary benefactors of government money are the largest producers of commodities such as corn, soybean, wheat, cotton, and rice. (thoughtco.com). This supports evidence that most farmers do not benefit from federal farm subsidy programs. Besides, even farmers do not feel that subsidies are beneficial to their wellbeing. According to Scott Kinkaid, a Nebraska farmer, government subsidies do not help young beginning farmers and do not help rural America (taxpayer.net).
To assist in further determining the fate of the farm subsidies, it will be helpful to use a demand graph to determine if the big business farmers are supplying more than the public is demanding. One would assume that farmers would want their crops planted to create an equilibrium effect in order to limit unnecessary surplus. However, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, federal peanut subsidies are influencing planting decisions which are producing waste and market distortions. Farmers are overplanting in order to earn the subsidies which is creating crops which exceed consumer demand by 30-50% (taxpayer.net). Unfortunately, taxpayers are left footing the bill while big business farmers are profiting from the government program. Therefore, the United States government should stop providing subsidies to farmers in the agricultural sector.