The signs of economic hardship are flashing like strobe-lights. The signals are voluminous. Yet, like Hannibal and his elephants, the Biden administration and its slack-jawed, pop “news” lackies remain steadfast and unrelenting in their totalitarian trampling of reality, in their preposterous claim that things are going great for you when you frequent a grocery store and try to feed your family.
From the Wall Street Journal editorializing on the rising emergency of unsustainable government spending and government debt crowding out savings – even as federal tax “revenue” rose 7 percent year-to-year -- to Citadel economist and professor Richard Ebeling and Future of Freedom President Jacob Hornberger discussing the cost-of-living pressures that the D.C. graft machine is placing on millions of Americans, many, many people are trying to sound the alarms. Even BlackRock head Larry Fink has warned about double-digit annual price increases caused by the inflation of the money supply that the Federal Reserve conducts in order to facilitate the feeding of the government pork beast.
This situation is doubly frustrating not only because of the anti-constitutional pork projects and unabashed hubris of Biden’s gang telling us what is best “for the economy,” it also is frustrating because the Bidenistas have it in their power to undo many of their disastrous diktats that have made life harder and more expensive. Let’s take a critical look at five ways the Biden Administration could stop laying pressure on your food bill – five things that also indicate just how poisonous their standing policies are.
1. Stop paying farmers not to farm. In the insane and unconstitutional tradition of FDR-era programs like paying farmers to destroy crops, and paying swineherds to kill and discard pigs, and in the nutty tradition of George W. Bush’s administration funding plum-growers to destroy plum trees, did you know that, since 2018, the feds have been paying farmers to NOT FARM on vast portions of their land?
It's called the “Natural Resources Conservation Service,” the feds planted the new payoff scheme as part of the 2018 Farm Bill, and the Dem-RiNO gang in DC amped it up with MORE “incentives” of our money when they passed the insultingly titled “Inflation Reduction Act” put into motion in August of 2022.
Since that time, in fiscal years 2023 and 2024, the feds have handed powerful agricultural interests over $21 BILLION dollars to stop growing on sizeable portions of their land, to sell the land, or to give the big agricultural interests “technical assistance.” We’re talking 180,000 farms, and, according to the feds, at least 225 MILLION acres subsidized to go UNUSED for 10-year or 15-year periods.
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) actually, openly admits to the crime:
“The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) generally provides 10-15 year contracts to remove land from agricultural production. Most of the land enrolled in the CRP was in crop production prior to CRP enrollment and is now planted to an approve (sic) conservation cover such a mixture of grasses or trees.”
By the way, it’s for the “Climate” canard.
Reducing useable farmland means lower-than-could-be yield, which means less of the products consumers might want, which means… higher costs for you and me, in addition to the fact that the Biden gang is MAKING US PAY TAXES and is pressuring the Federal Reserve to print more money for this perverse depletion of crop yields.
2. Roll back corn-based ethanol mandates. In June of 2022, and in December of 2023 the Biden administration also perversely incentivized changes in field-space allocation when it answered the call of corn conglomerates and mandated an increased amount of corn-based ethanol to be used in our fuel. That helps the corn interests, but it hurts us because it crowds-out other forms of agriculture that can put EDIBLE FOOD on our table. As I wrote in 2007 for the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), when the Bush administration mandated an increase of corn-based ethanol in fuel blends, Fidel Castro, of all people, correctly noted that such manipulation of the agricultural sectors in the US would see less edible corn and other products such as beans being grown on those US farms, and would lead to higher food prices.
Corn-derived ethanol (as opposed to sugar beet ethanol, which is used in some other nations) also is a net energy loser, requiring more energy to plant, sow, and reap the corn, refine it, and transport it, than what it offers when burned. It also is problematic in cooler weather, because burned ethanol creates molecules that linger at low altitudes in cool temps, creating smog.
Related: Biden Closes MORE Land To Oil, Gas Drilling | MRCTV
3. Stop waging war on American energy. Fuel for creating fertilizers, transporting food and other products, for electricity, and for heat is much more expensive due to Biden diktats.
Indeed, when it comes to those corn growers mentioned above, it’s a natural next step to note that even THEY are experiencing higher costs to run their equipment and transport products because the Biden Administration has been hell-bent to become the worst and most immoral, anti-constitutional stranglers of energy availability since the Nixon Administration. From its most-restrictive-in-history-off-shore-drilling stance, to its blocks on Russian energy that could reduce prices, to its new increase in the cost for drilling on so-called “federal land” (which is not constitutionally “owned” by the feds), they keep raising our expenses, and it’s OBVIOUS.
But, in addition to the higher costs Biden creates through restricting energy for operation of farms and businesses, higher costs for our home heat and the energy needed to run grocery stores, and even for the transportation, there is the fact that, as I noted in January of 2022, many fertilizers either include nitrogen derived as a byproduct of natural gas services, or the actual clay needed for some fertilizers can only be made at high-heat, also requiring the burning of fuel. This has caused even the aforementioned corn growers to run into high costs for fertilizer, and sucks away more of our money at the store.
By the way, in Europe, government attacks on nitrogen fertilizer have destroyed the livelihoods of thousands of farmers.
So much for increasing productivity and the competitive power of the market. If Biden dropped his extant policies restricting energy imports, drilling, and transport via things like the Keystone XL pipeline, we could eliminate a massive pressure on our wallets, and, maybe, think about affording family meals again.
4. Cut useless red tape on the meat industry. That’s “maybe.” The fuel/energy portion of the economy is just one of our problems. The feds force onto food producers so many mandates one would need a book to cover them all, but, as an example, consider how much more fish costs because the federal government mandates that fishermen literally HOUSE what they call “fish-counters” on their boats, and the feds recently told fishermen that they had to pay the “counters” $700 to $800 a day. This, many fishermen are challenging in the US Supreme Court. If you'd like to learn more, check out the status of "Loper Bright Enterprises V Raimondo" at the SCOTUSBlog.
And then there is the USDA mandate that "organic" chickens must be given a certain amount of space to roam outside the hutch, and the long-standing federal command that small farmers cannot slaughter cattle for willing customers on their own farms, but, instead, must send the cattle to federally “licensed” mega-slaughter-corporations. That latter edict not only increases the price of food, it also increases the risk that dirty meat can infect larger portions of the population. Congressman Thomas Massie (R-KY) has introduced legislation called the PRIME Act to end this mandate, but he has not been able to pass the bill… so far.
Related: Biden Offshore Drilling Plan Is the Most Restrictive In US History | MRCTV
5. End the federal minimum wage.
Not only is it unconstitutional that the feds tell employers they must pay a certain amount – yes, that lovely, arbitrary, diktat of politicians, rather than the politicians leaving office and starting their OWN businesses to offer salaries they choose – it is immoral and anti-economic. When business owners are told they must increase pay for work that will not be valued that much by consumers, employers try many ways to deal with the government-imposed expense. Sometimes, they eat a portion by reducing their own salary. Often, they lay off employees and, within the new, government-mandated margins, invest in tech that they would not have utilized if they could have used human help for less.
Often, they incorporate much of those higher costs into higher prices, especially when American consumers are not allowed to buy cheaper alternatives because EVERY business is seeing higher employee costs and the feds also block cheap imports via tariffs.
The answer is not to increase tariffs. The answer is to lower the burden on the employers. And, as many economists will note, WE are the final employers.
Of course, all of this is happening within a sphere of out-of-control federal spending that pushes a new $1 TRILLION in debt approximately every 100 days. That spending relies on taxation AND on the issuance of bonds, which are purchased by the Federal Reserve, which, itself, creates worthless money to do it. That money competes against the money we already have, and bids up prices.
SO, as the final facet to this exploration, let’s add the big, SIXTH way to reduce prices.
END THE FED.
Allow private banks to hold stores of precious metals and issue currency we can trust and verify. Stop commanding us to use fiat currency. Stop blocking freedom of contract. Stop commanding how we can farm or raise cattle or heat our homes.
You want to help us, Joe?
Leave us alone.