How the farm bill became the everything bill
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Hello, everyone.
What is the Farm Bill and why is it significant for all Americans?
I'm Kimberly Adams. Welcome back to Make Me Smart, where none of us is as smart as all of us. Now, I know we talk a lot on here about how little Congress gets done, but there are at least attempts. And today we're going to talk about one piece of legislation that, after being stalled for ages, seems to be starting to move. It's the Farm Bill. Now, farm bills are massive pieces of legislation that cover a whole range of issues. And ideally, they're supposed to be updated every five years. But the last time Congress actually passed one was in 2018. So we are several years overdue. That said, earlier this month, the House Agriculture Committee finally advanced a proposed farm bill. But the road ahead for the legislation is pretty uncertain.
So here to make us smart about this is Chris Newbert. He's the deputy director of the Sweetie Center for Sustainable Food Systems in the School of Sustainability at Arizona State University. And he previously held several positions working on agriculture policy in Congress. Chris, welcome to the show. Great to be here. Thanks, Kimberly. I think when a lot of people hear the Farm Bill, they think it's something that only affects farmers. Why does this matter to the rest of the country? So the Farm Bill is separated into 12 titles, and each one tackles a specific piece of all of these programs, basically everything that USDA operates.
How is the Farm Bill structured and what issues does it cover?
And it covers not only farm subsidies, which I think most people are familiar with, or things like crop insurance, but there are also conservation programs in there. There are programs for rural development. And of course, the biggest one is Title IV, which is nutrition, and that reauthorizes SNAP. It makes any adjustments. It's a very comprehensive piece of legislation. So I always like to say, you know, if you eat in this country, the farm bill somehow is going to affect you. It really is a large and significant piece of legislation. And as you mentioned, a lot of these programs are expiring again, and they are in need of serious updates. And it would be great if we could see some sort of movement on a farm bill.
Yeah, it is such a big piece of legislation. And I know that we're chatting in an era of omnibus legislation for funding and big pieces all bundled together because it's so hard to get stuff through Congress. But how did the Farm Bill in particular come to have so many things living under that umbrella? Well, we're actually approaching the century mark of the first farm bill, which would have been the Agricultural Adjustment Act passed during the New Deal. And that was, you know, it started off, it was an emergency piece of legislation responding to the economic conditions that farmers were facing. And even that needed to be updated just a few years later. And so it became almost tradition every couple of years for Congress to revisit farm legislation, revisit whatever sort of price supports needed to be put in place.
But it became more and more difficult to get that piece of legislation passed. So right around the 70s, you started to see this coalition being built between anti-hunger advocates and the big farm groups. And they said, we need to work together and get legislation that we both care about across the finish line. So this farm and nutrition coalition started to become a really big deal.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–0:57
2
What is the Farm Bill and why is it significant for all Americans?
0:57–2:26
3
How is the Farm Bill structured and what issues does it cover?
2:26–5:47
4
What historical context shaped the coalition behind the Farm Bill?
5:47–8:50
5
Why has there been a delay in passing a new Farm Bill since 2018?
8:50–11:27
6
What are the financial implications of the Farm Bill and SNAP cuts?
11:27–15:01
7
What are the potential consequences of not passing a new Farm Bill?
15:01–17:06