Washington, D.C. – The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW) released the following statement of CCAGW President Thomas A. Schatz commenting on the “Fairness in Farm and Food Policy Amendment.”

            On behalf of the more than 1.2 million members and supporters of the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW), I applaud Representatives Ron Kind (D-Wis.), Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), and Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) for the “Fairness in Farm and Food Policy Amendment” that they will offer during consideration of H.R. 2419, the 2007 Farm Bill.

            This amendment will be the only opportunity for any reform of the unfair and counterproductive crop subsidy system being perpetuated in H.R. 2419.  The “fairness amendment” would gradually reduce the direct payments that were created in the 1996 farm bill.  These payments were intended to be phased out, not turned into an entitlement program for wealthy farmers, which was done in the 2002 Farm Bill.  The amendment also replaces depression-era price guarantees with a modern revenue-based safety net.

            The “fairness amendment” also denies subsidies to farmers with an annual adjusted gross income (AGI) greater than $500,000 and establishes an enforceable annual subsidy limit of $250,000 per person.  While the Bush Administration’s proposal to change the AGI limit to $200,000 would be the preferred level, the amendment is far better than the supposed AGI and subsidy reforms in H.R. 2419.

            In fact, the $1 million AGI limit in H.R. 2419 will impact no more than one-tenth of one percent of subsidy recipients.  Even more outrageous, while pretending to accomplish reform by eliminating the three-entity rule, which allows farmers to collect subsidies on up to three properties, H.R. 2419 increases the cap on direct payments and eliminates limits on marketing loan payments and loan deficiency payments, making it totally unnecessary to create multiple entities to evade those limits.

            Make no mistake about it: the 2007 Farm Bill as reported by the Agriculture Committee provides absolutely no reform of archaic farm subsidies.  It continues the same old policies that help the richest farmers get richer and doesn’t help small farmers stay on their land.  The “fairness amendment” should be adopted by the House.  Otherwise, farm programs will continue to undermine the economy of rural America, interfere with international commerce, and hurt poor farmers in developing countries, while also being costly to U.S. taxpayers and raising prices to consumers.

The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste is the lobbying arm of Citizens Against Government Waste, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government