King Corn

Corn is a seemingly harmless crop. You plant it, it grows, you harvest it, and then sell it. It’s a simple process. However, somewhere along the line, the process was skewed. Corn is now a crop that causes several deleterious effects across the country. Corn is overproduced because of several arbitrary government policies. These policies benefit no one but the largest of the food corporations. They should be abrogated. In order to understand why these policies need to be repealed, it is important to understand the context of their origin.

Until the fifties and sixties, the American agricultural system was governed by the New Deal systems enacted during the Depression. These systems were based on far more economical principals than the ones today. The systems were instated so that overproduction could be avoided, because overproduction only weakened the devastated market of the Depression era. The government would establish a target price. If the market price fell beneath this target the farmer could take out a loan from the government and offer his corn as collateral. His corn was now stored so that when the market price rose he could sell the corn and pay back the loan. If the prices did not rise, then he could keep the money and give his corn to the government, which would deposit it in the “Ever Normal Granary.” The granary was used to even out prices if they became erratic. The New Deal systems worked well. They helped to keep the market even when there were bad years and it cost the government very little because most loans a farmer took out were repaid when the cost of corn returned to normal.

The New Deal systems were not popular with everyone. The processing and exporting industries profited from overproduction. However, overproduction was limited with the New Deal systems. Eventually, they were abrogated. We owe our thanks to Mr. Earl Butz of the Nixon administration. He was the first to champion the idea that more corn is best. More corn is what is right for you. He advised farmers to pack their fields as tightly as possible and to “get big or get out.” He had one goal: to insure that food prices would lower and stay low. This he accomplished. He dismantled the New Deal systems and replaced it with a new system. In this new system the government pledges to insure that a farmer receives a certain price for his corn. If the market price is lower than this “guaranteed” price, then the government pays the difference. Unlike the New Deal systems, this system encouraged farmers to sell their corn at any price. It doesn’t matter because the government will make up the difference. Instead of keeping corn out of the unstable market, the system encourages the injection of more corn into the market.

The system of direct loans became known as subsidizing. And it had the intended effect: it drove prices down, way down. In fact, the prices are so low that farmers must, in order to stay even, grow and sell more corn. Corn subsidies keep price low and production up. Overproduction leads to the degradation of land, pollution of rivers and oceans, economic stress for the farmers of the countries to which America exports its corn. Finally, you will be glad to know that you, or at least your parents, are financing this operation. Corn subsidies cost the Federal Treasury five billion dollars a year. All of this, just to keep corn cheap. You have to wonder, why hasn’t Congress done anything to steer the country from cheap corn and its deleterious effects?

To answer this question, you have to see who is benefiting from cheap corn. Does it benefit the farmers? No. Does it benefit you? No. Then whom does it benefit? This is the age-old example of corporate interests triumphing over the common good. The truth is Cargill, and Coco-cola, and Tyson’s, and the cattle corporations and the just about every food-processing corporation is benefitting from cheap corn. It has been their interests that have struck down any attempt to steer America from cheap corn.

Now would be the time for the avid listener to point out that consumers benefit from cheap corn because it makes products cheap. That is true. But what is the real cost? The endurance of cheap corn has allowed it to seep into to just about every processed food. Corn is incredibly useful. Most processed food are different arrangements of corn and soybeans. So nearly all processed foods are constructed with corn, but surely eating meat is a corn-free activity, right? Wrong. At some point, corn prices became cheap enough for the cattle industry to feed its cattle with corn instead of grass. The same goes for the chickens. This change doesn’t seem like much of a problem, but you are in fact consuming corn in a different form when you eat a corn fed cow. Its simply another arrangement of corn, like processed foods.

Corn is the premier sweetener of processed food and drink. The best example is Coke. Coke is, however, a sad example. In every other country, besides America, Coke is sweetened with real cane sugar. Other countries do not have our corn laws and it is thus economical to use real sugar. And I have to say, the real sugar tastes better. But if you want a Coke with real sugar in it, you have to purchase a coke imported from Mexico. Let me reiterate that. We have to import Coke that has real sugar. Why cant Coca-cola use real sugar in Cokes here in the U.S.? Thanks to king corn, it is cheaper to actually synthesize corn than to simply use pure sugar. Cheap-corn is the reason high fructose corn syrup is everywhere. It is the premier sweetener in America. Here in America, you have to pay a premium for real pure ingredients. It is absolutely absurd.

If we try, we can steer ourselves from the America that is turning us into walking corn stalks. An America that values profit over pure ingredients and public health, is not and America that I want to be apart of. Legislative action is what turned us onto cheap corn, and legislative action can get us out. Cutting farm subsidies instantly would devastate the agricultural economy and leave prices to the whims of the world market. What we need is a Ten Year plan that slowly lowers corn subsidies until they no longer exist. This will allow for farmers to adjust as the change occurs. And once corn subsidies are no more, corn surpluses will become less frequent because farmers will not be arbitrarily driven to produce as much corn their fields can yield. This behavior pollutes our rivers and devastates the land. It supports an economy fed and driven by corn. Without subsidies corn would no longer be the cheapest and thus “best” option for food ingredients. Companies would turn to purer, and better tasting, ingredients. America without cheap corn would certainly be a better America.