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World attention has been directed to Wisconsin's Gov. Walkers "Budget Repair Bill." Most of the attention has focused on the Governor's effort to bust the public sector unions.
The fact is when unions were strong, middle class America was strong - all data supports that conclusion. In 1977 the ILGW (garment workers) had an ad which ended with, " So always look for the union label, it says we're able to make it in the U.S.A!" Pretty hard to find a lot of things made in the U.S.A.
Two other features of the bill have received less attention. One is the health care plan known as BadgerCare. Here is a news story which mentions BadgerCare and dairy farm milk price: http://www.wqow.com/Global/story.asp?S=14087832
According to statistics, 15% of those receiving BadgerCare are farmers. The reason is the driving down of farm prices at the same time jobs were being "outsourced."
Another part of the plan is to send more money to prisons. Wisconsin in 2008 spent 10% more than other states per inmate. The U.S.A which cannot make anything anymore, and cannot pay dairy farmers a fair price since parity was eliminated. The argument was the costs of government purchases were rising. Rising prison costs seems to not have been a problem. The U.S. has 5% of the worlds population and 25% of the worlds prisoners.
We have become a miserable nation since 1980. The idea of loving our neighbors seems to have vanished.
Does anyone on here ship to AMPI, I've been told that for the past 10 days they have been selling cheese on the CME preventing the price from increasing, and also attracting other sellers to the market. I'm amazed that an organization that is owned by farmers is helping to hold down milk prices, this is ridiculous! I don't ship to AMPI, so they wouldn't even take my call but if someone on here does, they need to be called.
ReplyDeleteAn interesting tidbit about federal prisons..Why is it they are allowed to dump their waste in the rivers? An ex-inmate asked me why is it that dairy farmers cannot pollute the rivers, but federal prisons can. He said that he has seen and worked on grinders that grind up tennis shoes that prisoners flush (among other things) so that they will not be seen floating in the river. Also, why is it they have an illegal military tire dump a few miles from the prison, when farmers are limited to the tires they can put on silos? This same ex-prisoner said the mosquitoes were so bad that no one went out in warm weather.
ReplyDeleteBunting you stated repeatedly much discussion is needed to bring this country back on track. It's nice to see you have your say,one blog post at a time! Hardin should turn you loose, you have more to offer then one realizes reading the milk weed!
ReplyDeleteSaying that middel class is weak b/c Unions are weak is foolish John. The printing of money wildly lowering the buying power of our $ is the big issue. Leaving the Gold Standard is another cause. Jos are outsourced to go to lowerer tax and operating cost related to regulation. A example is Chile has a very low 17% biz tax rate while we here enjoy a 30% rate. Thanks for your time on dairy issues. NWWa.
ReplyDeleteIn 1980 the national debt was what? About one trillion or so and it was a big problem then. Now fast forward to today... the 111th congress has added more to our dept than the first 100 congresses combined and now we owe about 14 trillion - to the fed (aka the central bank), and to other countries like china and so on. Businessweek reports we have a negative net worth of 44 TRILLION dollars - we're all slaves and the country is broke, the government can't buy and dairy products... or wait maybe we need to grow a set and learn the word "repudiation". Put these bums in the government and the fed up for crimes of treason and NOT PAY all, or at least most of the dept. What other options are left? Agreed, dairy farmers don't have time to be activist, but they are some of the most repressed.
ReplyDeleteJS