[cmrdporcupine]

Also a rural person living next to working farms, I'll just say this: Many things make more sense when you realize that farming is industry (and a workplace) and has to be managed by the state as an industry with similar regulatory, health & safety and environmental concerns.

The bucolic picture of farms as family homes combined with a flock of peaceful sheep, a family dog, and some silly chickens and a hard working sole proprietor is really hobby farming and a primarily aesthetic thing at this point.

The real world of the countryside is one of industrial extraction/production, but where somehow homes are mixed in. Not saying this is ideal, but a lot of the conflict that arises is around the disjoint nature of our traditional view of "the countryside" vs what it's actually "for" (industrial farming + future suburban development + mixed residential uses)

[engineer_22]

>The bucolic picture of farms as family homes combined with a flock of peaceful sheep, a family dog, and some silly chickens and a hard working sole proprietor is really hobby farming and a primarily aesthetic thing at this point.

I think the truth of your statement depends on local environment. In the area I grew up there are still small families running dairy operations. They have admitted it's getting harder to keep the farm competitive.

I agree farming has consolidated considerably since the mid 20th century. It's consolidation by design - the federal gov't has pursued policies to encourage consolidation. From a cost efficiency standpoint, it makes a lot of sense, but it has cost a lot of people their livelihoods.

The joke is, to make a million dollars in farming, start with two million.

[mistrial9]

> really hobby farming and a primarily aesthetic thing

no one can say that with certainty, you use the same rhetorical trick as people in politics when "progress is inevitable"

bad news for everyone -- the industrial world has spoiled the nest.

[giraffe_lady]

Believe it or not governments have a pretty strong interest in knowing this sort of thing so the data is certainly there!

It's been a while since I looked at it and it depends on what you consider a "small farm" to be. But when I last checked a few years ago, farms employing little or no outside laborers were a small minority. And more significantly here, those households were both above median household income and half or more of their income came from outside-the-farm sources.

You can twiddle with it if you want but to me that seems like a pretty reasonable definition of "hobby farming." Which is not a value judgement per se. Not being strictly dependent on farm income allows these farmers to pursue traditional or sustainability-focused practices that may not be economically viable otherwise.

But just be clear-eyed about it. The ideal of the small, self-sufficient, productive and profitable family farm is just that, an ideal and to a large extent a myth. In a very serious way it's not how things ever worked and, maybe unfortunately maybe not, it's not how they're going to now either.

[randomdata]

> The ideal of the small, self-sufficient, productive and profitable family farm is just that, an ideal and to a large extent a myth.

Depends on your debt load. My small farm is now sufficiently profitable with most of its debts paid off. If you are carrying massive debt like many farmers you need to grow bigger and bigger just to eke out a small margin as most of the potential profits are handed away to creditors.

It also depends on what you want. Often farmers purposefully drown themselves in debt in order to have amassed extensive wealth later in life. They could keep a tidy "mom and pop" business but want more. It's a question not unlike that faced in tech: Do you aim for nice little business that keeps you comfortable or try to blow up to be the next FAANG?

The profitable small farm is common enough, particular among the older generations who have their debts paid off, but, of course, those who remain small are much less visible. The casual onlooker only notices the big farmers with the big equipment, big buildings, and big acres. That no doubt skews perceptions.

[SlickNixon]

>The profitable small farm is common enough, particular among the older generations who have their debts paid off

The purchase of said farms and the paying off of said debts wouldn't happen to be enabled by a long career in tech by said older generations, would it?

[randomdata]

My farm has been enabled by tech. Certainly I see many doctors, lawyers, etc. down at the grain elevator playing the same game.

However, what I was referring to is that many older farmers just slogged through many years of making nothing until the debt was paid off. Not a whole lot different to what the indebted younger farmers are doing, as described in my previous comment, just that they're 40-50 years deep into the process and now sitting on that wealth.

[HeyLaughingBoy]

> seems like a pretty reasonable definition of "hobby farming.

No more than saying that a two-income household is "hobby working." The reality of a farmer needing multiple sources of income (including non-farm income) does not make it a hobby farm. A hobby farm is a very specific thing and includes the word "hobby" for a reason: the primary goal is not to generate income, like any other hobby.

[cmrdporcupine]

The thing is they've almost always been a small minority except for brief periods in history, and in certain places, that we tend to look at romantically. Looking back to Roman or Feudal estates, they were large operations run by dozen or hundreds of people. Yes, in Roman times there were smallholders, but they were never as efficient or large.

Farming is hard, low margin work.

[mistrial9]

this is not true - massive areas (larger than the mid-West of the USA) are being farmed that way right now.. South East Asia, midlands South America, large swaths in Africa, and large areas in modern India.. not counting whatever is happening in China territory..

[mistrial9]

> Believe it or not governments have a pretty strong interest in knowing this sort of thing so the data is certainly there!

professional researcher speaking -- your elementary-school approach is for someone else

> I last checked a few years ago, farms employing little or no outside laborers were a small minority.

news to no one

> You can twiddle with it if you want but to me that seems like a pretty reasonable definition of "hobby farming."

dismissal with faint praise, check

> The ideal of the small, self-sufficient, productive and profitable family farm is just that, an ideal and to a large extent a myth.

you now speak for all people in all ages, (edit) confident? If you want to show up as a voice of reason, you will need to show some better understanding of economic contexts over the last thousand years, not the latest NYTimes

[giraffe_lady]

Lotta shit talk but not a single refutation of any of these points. I said I'm not an expert and you said you are, care to show us?

[mistrial9]

among attorneys, this is a "burden of proof" moment. So now the burden of proof is on me, to show the history of farming economics. hmm

I will offer this -- economics as a science was invented to explain food trade, not the other way around! Food trade is the basis of empires, armies and abundance.. speaking of which.. while "family farming is a myth" the violence of armed warfare, its destruction and death, is not a "myth" .. maybe those humans who chose to wage war might have literally killed off the ones who attempted to wage "family farms"? History is written by the winners so, "family farms" are a myth while War gets daily headlines and new fresh billions in weapons and monetization ?

The burden of proof to refute that "family farming is a myth" in the face of daily war news in a place that is renown for fertile soils?

rural Mississippi might be part of this discussion, but so are the plains of Canada, and Argentina, and Eastern Europe. I have no chance of accurately describing histories in South East Asia, big parts of Africa or South Asian subcontinent.. but those people have "family farms" right now?

let's agree to set aside the personal indignations -- this topic is massive and I suggest, not at all solved.

[cmrdporcupine]

I never said I liked it. It's not a "rhetorical trick" because I'm not advocating anything. Just simply describing what is out there.

Myself, I am generally what you'd call anti-capitalist by convictions; but I've lived rural most of my life. And never in the actual "industry" that dominates the rural world, just... next to it.