Outrageous! Farmers getting trapped by Feds for "money laundering"

[mojave]

While the CBN reported this on July 17, the account was in several papers back in April.

citypaper.com

fredericknewspost.com

Randy Sowers, one of the farmers involved, later admitted that he had intentionally kept deposits under $10,000 at the advice of a teller.

As an interesting side note, Randy Sower has been receiving government farm subsidies. Their subsidies probably more than offset any money taken by the government (not that it was right to seize the money).

Randy and Karen Sowers, who have operated South Mountain Creamery in Middletown since the early 1980s, said they were reluctant to use subsidies and tried to go without them for years. Randy Sowers said a farm bureau agent told him that available money would go to another farmer if he didn't accept it.

"It's going to go somewhere," Sowers said.

The Sowers have received commodities over the years when milk prices have dropped as well as loan deficiency payments and crop insurance.

"What people don't understand is that the government, back in the 1940s, said they're going to guarantee the Americans are going to have cheap food," Sowers said. "The only way to keep farmers in business producing cheap food is to subsidize them. ... We probably wouldn't be in business if it weren't for all that (loan deficiency money) throughout the years."

 

[Gregadd]

I am sympathetic to Randy and Karen. I thought farm subsides such as allotments and soil banks operated to avoid overproduction and keep prices high. Let's not forget that great subsidy called food stamps. Some people just can't admit they are on the "welfare."

 

[mojave]

I had a high school classmate try to grow dry land corn about 10 years ago in an area that you could only grow corn if it was irrigated. The annual rainfall was only about 19". His corn crop didn't make it, but he received over $200,000 in government subsidies that year for disaster relief! It would have been cheaper to just pay him $100 grand to not farm.

 

[rblnr]

You find this to be acceptable? Did you know that the entire account of each farmer was frozen during this "seizure" [for an undisclosed duration of time] and that many farm workers may have had to be laid off as a result? What about the loss of production and loss of unattended crops/profits during this time? Many questions and scenarios I could come up with but I will stop here. There are many farms out there that could go bankrupt with just one seizure which IMO should not have happened to begin with.

Tom

I don't find it acceptable, nor do I find it believable that the govt. is targeting small farmers because it's after their money. I'm sympathetic to the Sowers, but whether it's a law that needs tweaking, a lack of understanding or lack of getting proper advice on the part of the Sowers, and/or a lot of things we don't know the details of, I don't see evil here. Certainly not something to hold up as an illustrative example of something larger.

Yeah, there are a lot of rules and regulations. But if you think doing business in the US is difficult, try doing it anywhere else.