Farm Subsidies Go to Farmers of New York City

The New York Sun reports:

Billionaires Edgar Bronfman Sr. and Leonard Lauder are among the New York City-based "farmers" who have received federal farm subsidies in the past several years, according to a new set of data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Between 2003 and 2005, Mr. Bronfman received $17,455 in subsidies for his farm in Virginia's Albemarle County, and Mr. Lauder received $3,015.58 between 2003 and 2004 through his share of an organic farm in Idaho, the data show. Mr. Lauder no longer owns shares of the farm and has stopped receiving subsidies, aides said. Messages left at Mr. Bronfman's office were not returned.

Until last year, the names of Messrs. Bronfman and Lauder were concealed behind farming companies and other ownership structures, but on a new set of records the USDA connects each owner of a company to the subsidies they received. Officials at a public interest group, Environmental Working Group, made the records available on its Web site this morning.

"It shows that we have a farm subsidy program that doesn't have much to do with keeping farmers on the land," the president of the group, Ken Cook, said. "They've gotten the money from you and me in the name of saving family farms and it's actually being used by big companies to gobble up the farms around them."

Maybe it's time to get rid of farm subsidies,unless you think it's fair that the rich get money.