In addition, ranchers get money back from the government to pay for water tanks and fences. Government-paid hunters help ranchers by killing predators, such as coyotes. A hundred million is hardly a budget-buster. But a subsidy ought to return more public benefits than this one. Most of the cows munching public grass belong to rich individuals or businesses.
Cattle ramble through a stream on public land in northern Nevada.
Neither the little guys nor the big guys should be subsidized. Granted, these are hard times for small ranchers, and small farmers, who want to keep living as they've been living. Granted that America has a soft spot for those who live off the land. But the world moves on, and not just in agriculture. No one in America gets a guarantee that they'll be able to do what their parents and grandparents did for a living, whether it's farming, owning a haberdashery store, or being a college professor.