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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by M.W. Hemphill I have a wry smile, cbt141, because you already know the answer to that: none. Bulk commodities are low value. The stuff will hardly pay for the short-run variable costs of transportation even now. Coal will pay for some modest renewals, but not for enormous additions or renewals. If anyone needs more coal in the ocean trades that badly, they'll find plenty of it within a stone's throw of tidewater in Colombia and Australia. Grain will pay for almost nothing. For example, the total value of the U.S. wheat export in 2001 was $3.5 billion, which in trade terms is a pittance: how much of that could pay for rail investment above and beyond the current levels it's already paying, and still move to market without subsidy? Heck, it already IS moving to market with the aid of subsidy -- export credits, highway infrastructure, farm credits, etc., etc., etc., etc. But maybe "pay for infrastructure" is code word for "divert tax dollars to subsidize U.S. landowners whose hobby is farming." We could do that if we want, though it's depressing to think about. [/quote] I work for both the USDA and ISDA, and I can tell you that these so-called subsidies barely compensate for the morass of regulations that saddle the U.S. farmer with artificially high production and transportation costs, costs not borne by ag producers in other nations. Remove these regulations first, then you and your kind can rant and rave about farming subsidies all you want.
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