Members in the News: Dorfman, Barnett, Sharma, Hurt, Featherstone, Guan, and Kumar

Jeffrey Dorfman, University of Georgia Democrats Can Choose Pro-Growth Economic Policy Or Anti-Growth Redistribution Written by Jeffrey Dorfman: Forbes - March 20, 2019 In an election cycle virtually guaranteed to feature a record high number of Democrat presidential candidates, those candidates have two options: appeal to voters with ideas designed to make the nation better off in aggregate or appeal to our baser instincts and promise free stuff paid for with money confiscated from the “wealthy,” meaning those people with more money than the voters at which the appeals are aimed. From the early pronouncements of the candidates so far, it appears that some candidates will take the first road, while many will take the second. (Continued...) Read more on: Forbes Barry Barnett, University of Kentucky Ohio Valley Farmers, Electric Cooperatives Push Back On Trump’s Budget Cut Proposals By: WKMS-FM - March 15, 2019 University of Kentucky Department of Agricultural Economics Dean Barry Barnett said the cut in crop insurance subsidies is surprising to him given Trump’s vocal support for farmers, but it isn’t anything new. “This really isn’t a partisan thing,” Barnett said. “It’s really been more of a situation where administrations have been proposing these budget cuts for several years now, and Congressional appropriators have refused to go along with those proposed cuts.” (Continued...) Read more on: WKMS-FM Sankalp Sharma, Kent State University at Tuscarawas Christopher Hurt, Purdue University Distress Grows For Ohio Valley Farmers As Trade Deals Stall By: WFPL - March 18, 2019 “If you look at all the large farmers, these guys have the storage facilities to wait out bad prices,” Kent State University-Tuscarawas Agribusiness Professor Sankalp Sharma said. “For a lot of these small guys…they couldn’t actually store their commodity, they still had to deal with those lower prices.” Sharma and others [Chris Hurt quoted in the article] argue grain prices have been low for five years because farmers are overproducing, and tariffs are only making the situation worse. (Continued...) Read more on: WFPL Allen Featherstone, Kansas State University The Agricultural Struggle By: KWIT-FM - March 19, 2019 Tariffs have been making it difficult for farmers to pay off loans. To learn more about how higher tariffs are affecting farms, we spoke with Allen Featherstone. Allen Featherstone is the head of Department of Agricultural Economics at Kansas State University. He says for over a year the farm economy has been struggling. Some of the struggles include increase in collateral, negative incomes, and the buildup of farm incomes over the years. (Continued...) Listen on: KWIT-FM American farmers confront a mental health crisis By: Waco Tribune-Herald - March 20, 2019 “The peak of the crisis was in 1986,” said Allen Featherstone, an agricultural economist at Kansas State University in Manhattan. “It is the worst since then by far.” (Continued...) Read more on: Waco Tribune-Herald Zhengfei Guan, University of Florida Florida strawberry farmers say U.S.-Mexico deal may be a rotten one By: Florida Politics - March 19, 2019 “The split of interest groups and the level of tension between the Northwest and Southeast are staggering, at a dangerous level,” Zhengfei Guan, Assistant Professor at the Gulf Coast Research and Education Center and University of Florida’s Food and Resource Economics Department, wrote in an email. “The government should take the situation seriously and work out a solution acceptable to all involved, either inside or outside the USMCA trade deal.” (Continued...) Read more on: Florida Politics Anjani Kumar, International Food Policy Research Institute Access to formal credit increases income of farmers By: The Hindu BusinessLine - March 10, 2019 Besides, access to institutional credit increases the per capita monthly consumption expenditure (MCE) by 10 per cent compared to those without formal credit facility. The per capita MCE is a proxy for household income and, therefore, an increase in household expenditure reflects a decline in poverty, said Anjani Kumar, Research Fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), New Delhi Office. (Continued...) Read more on: The Hindu BusinessLine

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*Articles in response to the AAEA Communicating Out Strategy Press Releases highlighting: Government Relations, American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Applied Economic Perspectives & Policy, Choices Magazine, General Media, and/or 2018 AAEA Annual Meeting in Washington D.C.