doctortay:

lesbiskammerat:

the use of the word “farmer” to mean not just people doing actual, important farmwork, but also include the parasitic capitalists who simply profit from those people’s labour.. incredibly insidious. so many policies marketed as “helping farmers” are really aimed at supporting people who exploit farmers, furthering their misery

Some helpful context:

“To be treated as a farmer in America doesn’t necessarily require you to grow any crops. According to the Government Accountability Office, between 2007 and 2011 Uncle Sam paid some $3m in subsidies to 2,300 farms where no crop of any sort was grown. Between 2008 and 2012, $10.6m was paid to farmers who had been dead for over a year….American farm subsidies are egregiously expensive, harvesting $20 billion a year from taxpayers’ pockets. Most of the money goes to big, rich farmers producing staple commodities such as corn and soybeans in states such as Iowa.”

Farm subsidies overwhelmingly go to corporate farms, not the family farmer the government wants you to think they’re going to.