Herb Kohl: “I had hoped that the last vote had ended the debate on dairy compacts. But if my colleagues wish to eulogize these…”

“I had hoped that the last vote had ended the debate on dairy compacts. But if my colleagues wish to eulogize these cartels, I am happy to join them. First, I want to explain why I care so much about this issue. Wisconsin is the dairy state. We have 22,000 farms, and almost all of them family-owned businesses. We have thousands more residents who make their living buying and selling dairy products, farm equipment, barns, feed, even the early morning coffee served to the farmers who come to town straight from their milking barns each morning. Dairy compacts do not only strike at an industry in my state. They strike at the heart and soul of Wisconsin, at our way of life. The Northeast dairy compact legislatively raises the price of class I milk above the prevailing federal milk marketing order price for farmers in the States lucky enough to be in the compact region. By a complicated formula, all dairy farmers in the region--regardless of what class milk they produce or for what use--receive some extra subsidy from the region's milk processors based on their overall milk production. Of course, this is a classic anti-market incentive for these farmers to produce more milk than the region needs or demands. Besides having a very real cost to the Treasury, the overproduction of all sorts of milk in the compact region causes prices to fall in non-compact states for milk used to produce cheese, butter, milk powder and other products likely to be exported out of State.”