Congress and "The Sugar Racket"
Did you know that Congressional action, or perhaps inaction, keeps “domestic sugar prices two or three times higher than world prices?” Chris Edwards, Director of Tax Policy Studies at the Cato Institute explains in the June 2007 Tax and Budget Bulletin:
“Federal sugar policies confer benefits on a small group of sugar growers, but they damage consumers and U.S. food companies. Congress has provided a sweet deal for sugar growers since it imposed import tariffs on sugar in 1789. Controls on domestic sugar production date back to the Jones-Costigan Act of 1934.
“When the Republicans controlled Congress, they shied away from reforming sugar policies in the 1996 and 2002 farm laws. The majority Democrats now have a chance to show that they are different. By reforming sugar policies, they could cut food costs for average families, make U.S. manufacturing more competitive, and end unfair benefits for a small group of wealthy sugar barons.”
Edwards cites a recent study by the Commerce Department of the economic effects of federal sugar policies. For example, "(S)ugar costs are a major reason some U.S. sugar-using businesses are relocating abroad." He sums up the big question that taxpayers should be asking their Congressional representatives thus:
“Given the negative economic and environmental effects of U.S. sugar programs, why do they persist? Because Congress often decides to confer benefits on a favored few at the expense of the general public.11 In this case, the favored few really are few—about 42 percent of all sugar program benefits go to just 1 percent of sugar growers.”
Congress has many ways of taxing us. Taxes are only one of them. Tell them to fix the sugar racket in the farm bill now moving through Congress!