Milk for $6 won't float

[ponto]

Bill Peterson, Mason County extension agent for the University of Kentucky College of Agriculture, said milk for six bucks a gallon probably wouldn't float.

"Anything is possible," Peterson said, "but there is still supply and demand. The question is, will the market be able to handle $6 a gallon? I doubt it."


.

Source (http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070628/BIZ/706280346/1001)

[Maxwells]

Well, if mike goes to $6.00 bucks a gallon I will not be able to afford that, and they better think of the children who drink milk, tht is good for them to drink and they won't be able to afford either. And what about the Schools. Come On...........

[chevy]

So what happened? Did cows go on strike and demand a pay raise? :drum:

Sorry, had to say it.

[Chuck]

Now pardon me cause I am thinking out loud and that doesn't mean I am right, only that I am trying to figure it all out.

A farmer gets 2 bux a gallon for his milk. His cows on average produce 2 gallons per cow per day or basically 4 bux a day per walking cheese burger. I know I am close on this figure but no accurate.

Last I check a cow is bigger than me and eats more than me. I know I cannot eat on 4 bux a day.

A dairy farmer compensates for this by getting more cows. But still you have that overhead thing that is required in that business. Generally the rule of thumb is 1 cow per acre of land. Take in the fact that you still have to manually feed dairy cows and in the winter it is 100% manual feeding.

Lets say you can get 100 cows on 50 acres of land with 25% manual feeding. All that high tech milk sucking machines. Plus the cost for the rundown house the family lives in.

I don't see how they make it.

I bet of that 6 bux a gallon the farmer will only see another .50 cents to a dollar per gallon of that money.

I will complain about the price but then again we don't use that much milk. The bottom line is what ya going to do???

[kdown]

Chuck is on the right track about the problem.

The following is happening in every dairy state. The law of supply and demand is kicking in. Less cows, less milk, higher prices. We've lost 200,000 cows in New York in the past 10 years.

According to national statistics, there's been a 80 percent loss of dairy farms in the past 20 years. The University of Massachusetts Extension, which provides outreach to the agricultural community through its Agriculture and Landscape Program, reports that eight years ago there were around 500 dairy herds in the state. Now there are 163.

[Chuck]

I am so glad you brought up supply and demand. The problem we are experiencing with the milk supply can be summed up in one word. Subsidies.

Subsidies, we pay many farmers to not produce. By doing this many farms have all but closed down to make an income. Some turn their farms into tourist attractions to in cress business all while being paid to not grow or produce.

In my business I am force to make a profit or close my doors. The only potential for a subsidy is the welfare system. I don't qualify for that, so I am forced to continue working which I do very happily I might add.

In my opinion Subsidies are a theft. It is the Robin Hood Syndrome. Take from the rich and give to the poor. However in the form of a Subsidy it is being paid by others to not produce.

Now not to be totally harsh, Subsidies do help in times of financial crunch. Bad news is that when the crunch hits a farmer it is usually to late for a Subsidies to help. Unless your an Airline Company but that's a different topic. They can be making a profit and still get a subsidy.

In short after being so long, most shortages are created to match the demand. When the demand increases, Subsidies should stop,,,, but they don't. We just keep paying, in taxes and at the store.

[Maxwells]

Well this is just awful, I know my grandfather years back was a farmer and had milk cows. What a shame. Nothing better than a farm if you can afford to keep it going.

[acoolmom777]

I have a daycare and go through at leat 8-12 gallons per week......:fear:
We will so be doing more Juice and water....

[Chuck]

I am still researching Dairy Farmers and Subsidies. So far all I can find is information of Large Herds over 1000. Doesn't look like small herd Dairy Farmers get a Subsidy.

[drago]

one of the biggest problems facing dairy farmers at the moment is the drought...no rain means no corn and no hay and that means alot of dairy farmers have had to sell off part of thier herds.

[mark]

I don't see how they make it.



They aren't making it.

That's why the small farmer is doing other things besides milking.........see ya mark

[Bengals_Mama]

It's hard to be a dairy farmer these days. Our preacher is a dairy farmer, and it is very time consuming, with not enough pay. The price hike is due to a couple different things, like gas prices, drought, and not being able to hire Mexicans. A lot of the farmers got a lot of help from the Mexicans in the area... and with all this illegal crap going on they are afraid to hire anyone to help. Plus, they can't pay much, and most people won't work for that low of an income. Hopefully the government will start paying more attention to the farmers, and realize that our food doesn't really come from the store.... it comes from our farmers! If we can't produce our own food here, we will not survive. There's no reason to be buying our food from other countries, when we can produce it here. My grandpa traded his milk cows for beef cows, it was just getting too hard on him. I don't think people realize how hard it is to milk cows... perhaps you should visit a dairy farm sometime. It's really interesting!

[Flame]

Let's see to be a dairy farmer you don't get two weeks vacation. Lord you don't get a day off unless you hire someone to milk for you. Which happens twice a day, every day. Then you can't really survive on that so you spend the day working the tobacco, the hay fields etc.....when it gets to be evening and you want to rest well you gotta milk again. After the milk truck picked up the milk you have to clean out the milk tank because if it gets bacteria in it you have to dump the milk for so long till it tests ok. Oh and you don't get paid for what you dumped out. But you still have to milk them twice a day. Like working for free. The entire family used to work the farm and you did not have to hire anyone. Now kids are too busy (mine as well) playing video games. I for one hated it and went to school to be a nurse so I didn't have to. I've always said farming is dangerous to your wealth.

[scjackson]

I grew up on a farm and I might add with some very good memories. But my dad would say to someone he couldn't take a day off because he would have twenty or thirty women looking at him with long sad faces. I also might add in the summer when milk cows were giving more milk, then milk prices that farmers got would go down. So it does seem odd with prices being so high for milk at this time of the year. Also, on the dairy farms, farmers have been going out of business for the last 10 or 15 years because the cost of farming was so expensive and also you couldn't get anyone to work because it would count against their food stamps or check so they wouldn't work or they would want you to pay them under the table. This is before Mexicans came to this area to work.

[tkcomer]

What is the price per hundred weight that is paid to the farmer? You have a lot of variables going on in this milk thing. One, mega farms drove out a lot of the small dairy farms. They just couldn't compete as that drove the price of raw milk down due to over production. Prices went down in the store and people loved it. But it is a double edged sword. It's kinda how they consolidated the chicken and hog market. Drive out the little guy and let the big guys get a handle on controlling prices Then there's the beef side of it. A lot of farmers traded dairy for beef because of high prices for beef. That area hasn't been consolidated by the mega farms yet. The import bans on beef due to mad cow disease has driven up the cost of beef in this country. When enough of the little guys swap over to beef, watch the price bottom out and drive a lot of them out of business. Just like hogs a few years ago. 25 cents a pound at the yard, but not one cent less at the store. Mega farms keep the price the little guy gets low enough so that they can't compete. Once all the little guys are gone, look out. We have a shortage. But we never run out do we?