Global Connect

Stay away from my Farmville Farm you crazy Kiwi.

As the few of you who read this probably have figured out, I like to provide you with a little anecdotal fun. I think of it as my gift to you because really, who takes a keen interest in reading some random guy’s blog about international relations? Anyway, I know probably all of you are on or have heard of Facebook (you are in the 21st century right?). Well, there is this AWESOME game called Farmville. You should really check it out. You get to create your own farm, cultivate different crops, raise animals, build barns and homes and whatnot. The real feature that is cool is you get to have different neighbors who are your Facebook friends that are also playing Farmville. The not so cool thing about this is that, besides my American friends, my New Zealander and Canadian friends are taking over my farm.  Really. I’ll log onto Farmville one day expecting to see my cows doing there thing and then BAM! All of the sudden I will notice that these people are working on MY farm. Worse yet, sometimes they will GIVE me rabbits and cows. Like I need anymore of those. Come on guys! You have enough farms. Doesn’t New Zealand have a higher sheep population than human population? Really? Really.

Onto the important stuff now. Do I really care that New Zealanders and Canadians are taking over my fake farm? Not really, and in reality I do appreciate my friendships with Scott and Shane. The real thing that I’m getting at is the extent at how nationalist domestic agri-business is.

There is a handful of congressional districts in the United States which influence the massive transfer of wealth from the American taxpayer to sustain US agriculture. Yes, I said it a massive TRANSFER of wealth. Now, holding that most of these congressional districts are heavily conservative, it doesn’t seem very wise to complain about socialism encroaching on American ideals when in fact you are supporting one of its many forms. The worse thing about it is that people are perfectly fine with it. The “Buy American” mantra seems to be inate in many of us, when in fact- Not Buying Everything American is more economically wise.

If you haven’t been convinced yet, then perhaps you need to visit or revisit your college Microeconomics class. In its most simple form, there is a price for a product (here an agricultural good) dictated by the Law of Supply and Demand, and now that the world is very interconnected, there is a world price. Now, a country with extremely high living standards compared to, say, Burkina Faso means that the price of producing an agricultural product is higher. To obtain a profit as well as pay off fixed and variable costs, the producer needs to raise prices- most of the time above the world market price which may be what it is being sold at in other countries.  In order to depress agriculture prices, we as Americans pay for many farmers to keep their standard of living and be competitive on the world market. Wow. Socialism.

To be fair I must say that this is what occurs in certain agricultural products which are (at world market price) more competitive compared to other countries. Those include, but aren’t limited to, cotton, rice, sugarcane, corn, etc. There are agricultural products we could still be competitive with and not subsidize.

So, the next time you want to Buy American, make sure to bring your sickle and hammer. Don’t forget to wear a red shirt either.

By the way, look at that crazy New Zealander trying to take over my farm. Crazy guys…