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I think he voted for obama if I remember correctly

redrobin

Well-known member
http://www.agcenter.com/newcattlereport.aspx

INVESTING FOR THE FUTURE



Fixing a fence or buying a new pickup isn't exactly investing for the future. Hundreds of daily decisions require the expenditures of money for continuing commerce. Many of those decisions are simply repair type options. You decide the cost of maintaining an asset exceeds the probable savings of purchasing a new asset for production. In agriculture as in many industries, people tend to weight the expenditures to the under five year life cycle term.



The best barometer of the health of an industry or a country is the measurement of capital outlays whose value is not realized in under five years but in 20-30 years. Whether you are a country or an industry or a business within a industry, investment in long term assets is a good predictor of confidence in the future. Currently the long term investment barometer is at an historic low and companies are sitting on cash and many choosing to buy back their own stock for a current return rather than invest long term for a future they see as uncertain.



In the beef business, the same trends are apparent. People are willing to fix what is currently broken but few are willing to make a wager on the long term health of their business. No small part of this problem is molded by government policies that are either friendly to the future or scary to investors. Whether it is a national health care system, that is anything but understandable, or mandatory executive changes to wages and pay systems, business people are wary. This wariness and uncertainty leads to sitting on your hands in your business.



The decision of whether to spend thousands of dollars today to keep the feed mill running or spend millions of dollars to build a new feed mill is based on confidence in the future. The pathway to confidence is a well defined vision expressed by government leaders that is missing today. The pathway to the future must include supporting policies not impairments. In agriculture, we care whether the government is planning to intrude on our land, water, or air. We care if hard work is rewarded or penalized. No wonder Alan Greenspan is alarmed by the loss of long term investment in our country and the damage to our future and wrote a book to tell us about it.
 
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