Affordable Health Care Is Key to Innovation in our Food System
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto 
on 01. 6.09
image credit: The Irresistible Fleet of Bicycles
There are many factors that keep people in jobs they hate; in America, one of them is health insurance. Steph Larsen writes at the Ethicurian how the lack of health care is impeding America's agricultural revival.
We hear frequently about the need for new and younger farmers, but there are many barriers to attracting young people to farm in a way that will foster sustainable local food systems. One of them, however, looms bigger than the rest:Access to affordable, dependable health care.
Civilian Conservation Corps at an experimental farm, 1933, National Archives
Larsen continues:
The sustainable local-food system we are trying to build relies on an abundance of small, diverse, sustainable family farmers scattered all across the United States. For this kind of farm to exist, sustainable must mean more than environmental sustainability — it must also include economic viability. Farming is a dangerous and risky business, and it becomes a whole lot less attractive when a farmer knows that he or she is one fall from the hay loft away from losing their land.In order to attract more farmers to grow food for a sustainable food system, we need meaningful health care reform that addresses the needs of farmers, rural communities, and small business owners. The stark reality of health care costs for farmers, who often must purchase insurance as individuals and pay more for it as a result, is enough to make anyone waiver [sic] in their desire to start a farm.
Interesting point; for readers in Canada or the UK, access to health care is probably one of the last things they think about when starting a new venture. More in the Ethicurian
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Translation:
There are many barriers to attracting young people to farming, so we'll just pick one that we want to flog today...
Then, the article goes on to say:
"Farming is a dangerous and risky business"
Gee, I don't know whether or not that in and of itself might be a barrier to attracting young people to farming. That plus endless hard work, long hours, and low pay. If you really want to get into it, you might even consider the fact that not only are you one fall from the haystack away from losing your farm, you're one bad season away from losing your farm. That is, if you even own your own farm anymore, which in this day of factory farming, isn't bloody likely. You might even argue that the farmers employed by Monsanto and other factory farming companies get health benefits.
And by the way, this article's relationship to anything green is tenuous at best. Maybe it appeals to our lefty politics, but that's it.
I agree with "most" of what has been mentioned previously, but take exception to Ernie's comment about it being "bloody unlikely" in this day of factory farming, that a farmer owns his/her own farm and/or may be employed by a company like Monsanto or other. Rhetoric is a dangerous thing in my view. Specific to the dairy industry in which I have been a part of my entire life, in America, the fact is that 99.7% of dairy farms are privately owned, and regardless of size are a "family" business. No doubt, many younger people find agriculture an unattractive career choice due to all those factors mentioned previously, not the least of which is service of debt. It should also be noted that the larger the operation, the more likely benefits are offered to employees, whether it be housing, med/dental, 401K, etc.
Please don' be so quick to condemn large "family-owned" farming enterprises. The truth is, until such time as the majority of the population has sufficient incomes and/or are willing to pay a higher price for foodstuffs, economies of scale empower a farming enterprise to remain viable as the rise in input costs is disproportionate when compared to rather stagnant prices of milk, bread, etc. in the supermarket.