Small Farming Vs American Farming

Following the Civil War, a second industrial revolution in America brought many changes to the nation’s agriculture sector. The new technologies that were created transformed how farmers worked and the way in which the sector functioned. Agriculture expanded and became more industrial. Meanwhile government policies, or lack of them for a while, and hard economic conditions put difficult strains on farmers and their occupation. These changes in technology, economic conditions, and government policy from 1865 to 1900 transformed and improved agriculture while leaving farmers in hardship.

The most prevalent ongoing dynamic that encourages the self-exploitation of farmers in the Central Valley is the CSA movement. Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) is when, “Members support a farm by paying in advance, and in return they receive a share of the farm's produce; members also share in production risks, such as a low crop harvest following unfavorable weather.” While 54% of these farms in California make a profit, 32% and 15% either break even or lose profit. They tend to be more successful than traditional farms in California because they be closer to and cater to wealthy urban areas like the Bay Area who are willing to pay more in support of CSA endeavors, organic products, and local businesses. Also the farms tend to have more white owners and workers and come into their venture with more capital, which enable them to proceed to have successful business plans, a strong voice of advocacy, and higher average gross sales per acre. CSA businesses though

In the late nineteenth century, many American farmers were experiencing economic insecurity. There were various factors that contributed to why farmers were facing financial hardships in this particular time frame. The fundamental factors were the commercialization, overproduction, and mechanization of agriculture. These factors are by no means all of the driving forces that lead to this time of financial insecurity, but they are large contributors to say the least. After the Civil War, subsistence farming was gradually morphing into commercialized farming. Instead of farming to support oneself or one's family at a minimum level, farmers began leaning towards making large profit off of their crops.

The price per acre of farm land doubled to $2,140 over the last 10 years. A lack of health care also hurts farmers as farming ranks as the fourth most dangerous occupation in the country, and young farmers often must choose between health care and paying for their farm. All of these obstacles and more make farming a difficult occupation to enter. We need organizations such as Young Farmers’ to provide support, education and training to help our nation’s most important

Farming has many pros and cons. Influences such as where a person grew up, what values and beliefs a person holds, and his/her worldview effects a person’s opinion about farming. In his essay, “Renewing Husbandry,” Wendell Berry explains his views on industrialization and its outcomes in the economy. Berry sheds light on his opinions regarding farming due to his firsthand experiences with it. In his essay, Berry expresses his concerns for the lack of effort put forth by America’s Society regarding farming, but he also states the benefits from industrialization. Therefore, the lack of responsibility regarding industrialization diminishes its applicable benefits.

At the turn of the 20th century, the United States had become the leading industrial power in the world, due to 19th century technological advances which escorted America out of an agrarian based economy and into the industrial revolution. However, this period of transition made life increasingly difficult for American farmers. For example, improvements to America’s railroads presented a competitive advantage to large crop producers while placing family farmers at a substantial disadvantage. Furthermore, the prices of crops such as cotton, once the keystone of America’s agricultural economy, were falling which made it more difficult for farmers to survive. Consequently, farmers were forced to mortgage their property. Although some of the farmer’s complaints about life in the early 20th century, such as national monetary policy were unjustified, railroads and other consequences of the industrial revolution posed serious threats to the way of life for farmers.

In 1940, one farmer could feed a maximum of 19 people. Today, one farmer can feed over 155 people (Prax,2010). What changed? In the 1940’s many farmers relied on either working by hand or horses to work their land. However, horses tire out easily and working by hand takes an extensive amount of time. Because of these factors, farmers could only have small amounts of land, because that is all they, or their horses could manage. Today however, innovations such as the tractor and other motorized machines allow the farmers to work quicker and more efficiently; they are able to work more

I have lived in Small-town, USA my entire life. I have lived on a farm, been around farms and know several farmers. To me, the farming life is a normal way of life. I am one of those people mentioned in the movie, Food Inc., that believes, or shall I say, believed, that our food comes from the “perfect farm”. It was not until watching this movie and then discussing what I learned with others that farming is really a factory.

How does the corporatization of farming affect all Americans, not just those living in rural areas?

In the 1930s, during the Great Depression, Secretary of agriculture Henry Wallace introduced farm subsidies as a “temporary solution to deal with an emergency.” That emergency was a collapse of farm incomes with 25 percent of the population depending on agricultural earnings (Riedl, 2007). But today farmers make up just 1 percent of the population and farm incomes are well above the national average, making the original purpose of subsidies irrelevant (Kelley, 2016). On average, the United State’s Department of Agriculture spends $25 billion on farm subsidies every year with the majority being handed out to large farms and corporations. Through these subsidies, the government has created an exceptionally large welfare system for farmers (Edwards,

The agriculture field is one of the biggest employers, employing over 155 million people in the United States. What do you think about when you hear the word “agriculture?” Many people would say farming, but this is not the most common occupation in this field. Farmers make up a fraction of the agricultural jobs at 900,000, but over 2.1 million people own, rent, and claim farming as a primary source of income. The average farm size has dropped from 460 acres in 1990 to 418 acres in 2007, while the average age of this occupation rose to 57, making this one of the older workforces in the United States.

Whether we think about it or not, agriculture is a big part of our lives. The food we eat, the clothes we wear, the fuel we use; all of these are products of American agriculture. There is no escaping the fact that agriculture has an influence on each and every one of us; in fact, it has been impacting our culture for generations, and will continue to do so for years to come. All future generations will rely—at least in part—on agriculture.

Exploring farmers’ political and economic identities can demonstration how perceptions of economic disparity, awareness of political marginality, and the establishment of class-consciousness influence political behaviors and perceptions. In the late 19th Century, farmers saw themselves economically disadvantaged compared to capital investors and mobilized for populist policies and government assistance (Sanders 1999; Bensel 2001; Paarlberg, 1979). As stated by Molnar and Wu (1989), today, farmers have lost their monopoly on farm issues; now; they compete against environmental concerns and social-ethical political issues. Moreover, Lobao and Meyer (2001) state, farmers are becoming increasingly marginal producers in a centralizing industry; and, what happens at the macro level (e.g., farm economy, farms size) influences the micro level (individual) and vice versa. Identity and marginality promote notions of injustice and class comparison, therefore, understanding farmers’ notions of economic-political status add to the knowledge of U.S. class politics and rural consciousness. While most of the literature looks at rural America, the working-class and general voters, the time is ripe to expand this discussion to farmers and their perception of their economic and political status on

Today that push of farmers to leave their rural areas and move to the city can be associated with an inability to compete with large corporations. These large companies have the resources and ability to undercut and

In 1930 there was around seven million farms in the United States, now there is about two million. Advocates for farming and agriculture are worried about losing farms and farmland (source E). The total number of farms has fallen dramatically since the 1930s, but the number of larger farms has grown. Today small farms make up 92 percent of all U.S. farms and the other eight percent are large and very large family farms and nonfamily farms (source L). Even with the loss of many farms and farmers, the number of acres of farmland remains constant. The size of farms has increased, but not all farms are the same size (source E). The technology of today has made it possible to farm more land with fewer producers (source A). There is 915 million acres in farmland in the United States and the average farm size is 434 acres. In Kansas there are around 65,500 farms with 707 acres in average. Eighty-eight percent of the Kansas is under agricultural production (source L).