The farmers' proper gripe is with farm policy and lousy commodity prices. (I know, they have been known to complain about these, too.) When wheat is $3 or $4, and these farmers aren't making any money, the railroads are supposed to haul their stuff for nothing, I guess.
They also resent "sales" offered farmers better situated than themselves (sometimes with other shipping options). The railroads shouldn't be allowed to have sales?
Federal studies having consistently shown rail rates to even these disadvantaged farmers at about where they were 25 years ago, corrected for inflation, the railroads should tell them to blow it out.
We might not have as many farmers as we used to, but as long as there are more farmers than railroads, there will be demagogues in Congress trying to score points by pushing re-regulation.
Doubtfull...
(Don't buy the "Stewards of the Land" title attributed to farmers either - too many are just plain reckless Agri-dummies looking for another exemption as a solution to their own shortcomings)
The Grange helped beget the I. C. C. Far fewer farmers now than then. Will agricultural interests line up with electric utilities to force rates in their favor?
And the Journal thinks that this is news?? Where have they been for the last 150 years?
By Liam Pleven, on page B-1 (?)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703389004575304970143934734.html?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703389004575304970143934734.html?mod=WSJ_latestheadlines
Kind of the 'same old, same old' between BNSFand the various agricultural interests in the US West. I really didn't see much new in it, but nevertheless reference it here mainly in the interest of completeness, and for those who follow such matters, etc.
- Paul North.
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