18 posts shown.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about that old cliché we all hear growing up—the idea that "reading makes you free." We see it on posters in elementary school classrooms and hear it from well-meaning parents who want us to put down the video game controller and pick up a thick biography instead. For a long time, I took that literally. I thought reading was a way to build a fortress around yourself, a way to slip into another dimension where the stakes were different and the rules were more coherent than the mess we deal with in our daily lives.
When I was younger, I used books as a shield. If things were getting tense at home, or if I felt like I wasn't fitting in with the crowd at school, I’d disappear into a novel. For me, freedom meant the ability to be anywhere else but *here*. It was about escapism in its purest, most defensive form. You find a world that makes sense, or a world that is so wildly different from your own that your actual problems feel small and distant. In that sense, reading felt like a way to opt out of a reality that felt too heavy to carry.
But as I’ve gotten older, and especially as I’ve started engaging more deeply with literature that actually challenges my worldview, my perspective has shifted. I’m starting to wonder if we’ve been looking at the concept of "freedom" through books all wrong.
What if the real freedom isn't found in the ability to escape reality, but in the ability to face it more clearly?
I’ve had moments recently where a book didn't help me hide; it actually stripped away my excuses. I’ll be reading something—maybe a piece of historical fiction or a heavy family saga—and suddenly I’m confronted with a truth about human nature, or a reflection of my own family dynamics, that I’ve been trying to ignore for years. It’s uncomfortable. It’s jarring. It’s the opposite of a "safe" space. But in those moments, I feel a weird kind of liberation. It’s the freedom of no longer being able to pretend that I don’t understand something. It’s the freedom of having more tools to dissect the world around me.
There’s a massive difference between reading for comfort and reading for transformation. Comfort is easy; it’s the cozy mystery or the lighthearted romance that lets you drift off to sleep. Transformation is much harder. It’s the kind of reading that leaves you staring at a wall for twenty minutes after you close the cover because you’ve been fundamentally shaken. It’s the kind of reading that forces you to reckon with the legacies we inherit—the things passed down through generations that we didn't ask for but are forced to navigate.
I think there's a certain bravery in choosing books that act as mirrors rather than windows. A window lets you look away, but a mirror forces you to look at yourself. If we only read things that validate our current state of mind, are we actually becoming "freer," or are we just building a more sophisticated prison for our own biases?
I’m curious to hear how you all view this. Do you see your reading habits as a sanctuary where you go to forget the world, or do you see them as a way to equip yourself to deal with the world more effectively? Do you think there's a point where "getting lost in a book" becomes a way of avoiding the growth that comes from being uncomfortable?
I think I get why people outside this industry love to talk down to us and dismiss our subsidies, but honestly, I’m just exhausted from constantly explaining the mechanics of how this actually works—and how it *should* work. It would be like you working for a measly $0.00 when you should be earning $333; that gap of 3-4 $0.00 is exactly what the subsidy covers (which, let’s not forget, is funded by taxpayers—including yourselves, since you've earned enough to pay into the system too). Would any of you actually stick around for a $333 monthly salary if the government or the European Union didn't bridge that gap for you?
slysurfer14 said:Watermelons just don't grow like that around here, so don't let those locals pull a fast one on you...
Look, I’m not trying to go in circles here. Regarding taxes—pardon me, let me rephrase—it's not that you don't pay tax on a $20,500 income; it's that you pay on everything *above* that amount. But let’s be honest: $20,500 is an absolute pittance. How much is that monthly? $533 It’s a much more realistic picture if you consider this: you bring in $200,000 from farming—say, grain production—and your actual take-home profit is $40,000. At that point, you are definitely paying your fair share of taxes.
As for the watermelons—I have no idea where you're from—but when I talk about them, I'm specifically referring to Eastern Slavonia. If nobody in your neck of the woods grows them, then you can't even have "local" ones to begin with. Besides, there's a massive difference in quality. Take olive oil, for example: if you're on the Mediterranean Coast, you can get high-end oil from a local producer everyone knows and trusts, or you can get "local" oil that is complete garbage, or you can buy imported stuff. Not everything labeled "local" is actually good,...
And decent local goods will cost you, say, $47, while the cheap imported junk costs $23... In the case of these watermelons, we just happened to hit a similar price point. It's as if the imported oil and the premium local oil both cost $140.
slysurfer14 said:Look, obviously we're talking about revenue. How much of that is actually profit is a whole different story...
With Wheat, the profit is tiny, but with other crops it's way higher—something our local farmers just don't seem to get...
They just don't get it, you say? Let's put it this way: you see better margins in field crops like sunflower, canola, or maybe soy if the weather doesn't bake it into dust...
But let's talk about vegetable farming...
I personally tried my hand at butternut squash twice. First off, it's back-breaking work. Secondly—and here's the kicker—I would have made the exact same money if I'd just gone to work for a daily wage at $8.25 an hour somewhere else. The difference is that in a standard job, your only real risk is someone stiffing you on your pay for the day (around here, they pay $6.75 an hour, but you get cash the same day... so the worst case is losing one day's pay). I'm just trying to illustrate the gap...
Forget the squash, though; let's look at sweet potatoes. Some of my colleagues grow them, and honestly, if I managed to pull in $8.25 an hourly rate, they might scrape together $10... yet growing sweet potatoes is three times harder and the risk of total LOSS is massive. It isn't a matter of "I'll make $10 an hour"—you only make that if everything goes perfectly. If things go sideways, you aren't just broke; you're in the red. It's like taking a job where, at the end of the shift, you actually have to pay your boss for the privilege of working there...
The reality is that in vegetable farming, someone is always squeezing the margin, leaving you to work for peanuts while they take the cream. We aren't stupid; it's just that many crops simply aren't worth the hassle. For instance, my uncle planted plums specifically for Maraschino cherries years ago. You wait years for them to bear fruit, everything looks great, the prices from the producers are actually fair—they're quite decent—but then, after two years, they just stop buying. There are no other buyers, or the offers are so low it's not even worth the harvest. You can't pivot to brandy because it's a specific variety—say, you need 10 lbs of fruit for one liter of spirits, whereas a standard variety gives you a liter from just 2 lbs (I'm no distiller, but that's the ratio). People try all sorts of things, only to get cheated or left stranded when the sole buyer pulls out. I know a guy in a neighboring town who grows onions for Walmart; he does a fantastic job, but he's the only player in town. He floods his 7 or 8 acres, and Walmart doesn't need a single onion from anyone else in the area. The rest of us can't just plant onions because there's no market for us—there's a market, sure, but the terms are predatory, so nobody bothers...
slysurfer14 said:Why would that be stupid? Someone gives you a few million dollars for a nice view and you don't pay tax. Honestly, what kind of fantasy world are you guys living in...
Everything under 80 $0.00 is tax-free, so someone with an average salary isn't even making that much a year, yet they still hit you with taxes every single time...
And who exactly told you that’s tax-free?
You're completely misinformed. If your income hits 80 $167, it's absolutely taxable—income isn't the same thing as take-home pay. On that 80 $0.00 in total revenue, if you're left with 20 $0.00, well, good luck with that. And then, on that 20,000, you're paying a 12.5% tax... If you had a turnover $26833 of 80,000, then maybe you wouldn't pay, but with only 80 $0.00 in turnover, try surviving on 20 $0.00 a year if that's your primary business... If it's not your main activity, then that pay counts toward your income, so you'll be paying taxes regardless.
I won't go around quoting everyone here—it’s a waste of time. Let’s look at the reality: there are plenty of farmers out there managing 250 acres of wheat—or corn, soy, or sunflower, if you prefer, but let's stick with wheat for the sake of argument. If you asked me which single intervention would make the most impact, I’d choose herbicide application every single time. It’s the one thing that actually matters. If they can manage a decent yield from that, they might actually earn enough to cover the costs of tilling, prepping, planting, and harvesting. After all that work, they could potentially walk away with a subsidy of maybe $300,000—though, of course, that gets eaten up by corporate income tax. And let's be honest about the unfairness here: whether you're running a small family farm or a larger operation, being hit with a 40% tax rate is absolute madness. Ideally, those folks should also get access to modern machinery to actually make the labor manageable. Of course, that logic only holds water in places where land lease rates aren't astronomical. $133 Yeah, well—there are plenty of fields like that all over the USA.
Coming from the Midwest—where things actually make sense—there is absolutely no way that model works. At the end of the day, you have to actually turn a profit. $933 So, we're calling this an incentive—for what exactly? It certainly doesn't feel like one. $750 It's already happened. $603 Well, it’s alright—there are a few little perks tucked in there, but let's just say we should look at the whole package together. $650 If you want to pull that kind of money in—we’re talking serious capital here—you really have to earn it. $283 It’s all a bit much without some kind of incentive—honestly, if you want to actually pull in those kinds of numbers, you need a real reason to move. $283 Just pouring seed isn't enough anymore—you have to put in more work just to break even. Once you finally hit that point, you’re basically sitting at zero. To actually see a profit, you have to pull in at least that much extra, and even then, your actual earnings per acre end up being pretty slim. $233 You can't make this work long-term—it’s a losing game. You either have to farm massive acreage just to stay in the black, or you'll find yourself underwater within a few years. Between unpredictable ice storms, droughts, or a piece of machinery snapping shut and requiring a repair bill that costs more than the equipment itself, you're constantly one bad break away from needing to take out another loan just to survive.
Look, if you actually want to survive—let alone turn a profit—under the current economic climate (and trust me, looking at how things are trending in Germany, it’s only going to get much worse), you have to go all in. I’ve already laid out exactly what that entails, but there's a massive catch: this only works if you’re inheriting a solid foundation from your father or grandfather. If no one in your family has ever touched this business and you’re starting from absolute zero, my advice is simple: don't even bother with farming. You’ll spend your entire life just working to pay off the equipment—what I like to call "working for the iron." However, if someone actually left you something tangible to work with, then yes, you can make money—but you’re going to have to work your tail off to do it. All those little schemes people talk about—planting a few crops, doing a couple of operations, and just chasing government subsidies—that's nothing but pure nonsense. At least around here, where land leases are what they are, it's a fool's errand. $933 (private lands).
When it comes to consolidating land, you shouldn't be surprised if a boss like Mark approaches you—or if you end up at his doorstep—with a deal that sounds absolute. He’ll tell you that you’re going to manage his acreage and nobody else's. It sounds straightforward, but let's be real—there’s always a catch. We actually tried testing the waters with a small plot that sat right between our two properties, and once that guy showed up, we were left with nothing. Sure, there are plenty of reasonable people out there who play by the rules, but those types are the exception, maybe two or three in a hundred. The way I handle consolidation is simple: I wait for larger parcels to hit the market, or if the owner is dealing directly with me, I buy them then. Honestly, there isn't any other way to do it.
The whole concept of subsidies—though they didn't call them that back then—actually dates back to around 1947 in the Black Forest region of Germany. The local farmers there were facing a brutal reality: their yields simply couldn't compete with the massive harvests coming out of Southern Germany or central Germany. It just wasn't worth the grind. If a factory worker was pulling in 500 Marks, a farmer might struggle to scrape together 100 Marks—mostly because food prices weren't high enough to offset their low output. Faced with that math, people just packed up and headed for the cities, abandoning the land entirely. To stop that exodus, the government stepped in with what we now recognize as agricultural subsidies based on acreage. Suddenly, staying on the farm actually made sense—it allowed a farmer to match a factory wage, and it provided an extra cushion on top of that. There was also a clever secondary benefit: it kept consumer prices stable. Instead of forcing a systemic 20% hike in wheat prices just to ensure farmers could turn a profit—which would have sent bread prices skyrocketing at the grocery store—the subsidy bridged the gap without hitting the customer's wallet.
The issue with today's incentive is pretty straightforward—it's hard to get excited when Wheat has been stuck at this price point for basically fifteen years now. $0.33 The incentive fluctuates—sometimes by a few cents, sometimes more—but it’s clearly dropped. Given that shift, I have to wonder: what exactly was the logic behind bread prices dropping from 2?$1.00 Fifteen years ago, we were looking at one price—now, we’re staring at seven times that amount. Look, I get it: wages have climbed, commercial rent for a bakery has shot up, utility bills are through the roof... I follow the logic there. But it is sheer madness that bread prices have spiked by 300% while the cost of wheat has stayed virtually stagnant. Just imagine for a second what would happen if those government subsidies were scrapped. Let’s be real—those crooks in Washington would find a way to pocket that money regardless of how you spin it. If the subsidy disappeared, instead of seeing a modest 15% increase in costs, small businesses would be left footing the entire bill just to stay afloat. Honestly? If I were running a shop under those conditions, I don't know if I'd even show up to work for a plate of fish. And here is the kicker: instead of the price of bread rising by a reasonable 15%, you'd have all these middlemen, wholesalers, and bakery owners spinning a massive yarn about how much "costs" have increased. They wouldn't mention the 15% loss—they'd claim a 40% hike. In the end, the bread wouldn't go up by 40%; it would likely jump by 60%. So, instead of a 15% increase, we'd end up paying 60% more anyway. It's a rigged game. $2.25 rather than $3.75. there you have it...
slysurfer14 said:Honestly, I don't give a damn about some small farmer who'd rather toss his crop than sell it... Just like those roadside stands selling "homegrown" watermelons for $1.75 a pound when they're practically free at the grocery store.$0.67...Who cares, let 'em rot...
To be perfectly honest, I have NEVER eaten a high-quality watermelon from a supermarket. The stuff they stock in grocery stores is complete junk compared to the real deal—and let's be clear, not every local farmer grows the genuine article; in my neck of the woods, there are maybe ten growers, and perhaps only two or three of them actually produce the real thing. The rest are hit or miss... but a decent one will run you about 2-$1.00, whereas the supermarket variety is usually at least $0.67, making it a terrible value. I wouldn't buy it even if it were only 20 cents a pound.
bluetinker54 said:What do you mean "no land"? Of course there's land—it's leased. You pay for the lease, and that lease cost gets baked right into the overhead calculations.
It's just basic math, really; it works exactly the same way in any other business venture.
Precisely—I own some acreage myself, but even then, about 80% of it is leased.
slysurfer14 said:Look, obviously we're talking about revenue. How much of that is actually profit is a whole different story...
With Wheat, the profit is tiny, but with other crops it's way higher—something our local farmers just don't seem to get...
You're comparing apples to oranges here...
Let's look at it this way: suppose you sold some commodity—doesn't matter if it was wheat, corn, soy, tomatoes, cucumbers, almonds, squash, or carrots. You generated a revenue of 80 $167. Now, you also had expenses—let's say they hit 60 $0.00. Your actual profit is 20 $167, and then you still have to settle up with the IRS on that 20. Just try finding me a crop where you sink 80 $167 into it and walk away with 50 or 60 $0.00 in your pocket. It doesn't exist—at least not when you're looking at the long game. Even the guy who plants a hazelnut orchard is footing the bill for a dozen different things before he sees a single decent yield in year seven.
rowdypilot19 said:So, basically, the incentives aren't taxed, while everything else is.
I mean, that seems fine to me... I don't really get what people find weird about that?
subsidies count as taxable income
rowdypilot19 said:That’s like me saying I have to go into business with a guy selling lemonade on a street corner.
Nothing is mandatory, really. You just have to run the numbers and decide what makes sense for your wallet.
But 70 acres spread over 50 different plots... I honestly don't know how to respond to that without being rude, I guess.
What exactly did I twist?
I laid everything out pretty clearly. If something doesn't make sense, maybe just ask before jumping in with a comment.
I mean, obviously, to do the work, you need the machinery to do it. It takes a real genius to figure that one out, I suppose.
Sure, you can make money on it, but like I said, that cash is earned through blood and sweat—believe me. I don't have some guy sitting on 30 hectares of contiguous land at a rate of $333 per hectare of government land... I'm not exactly a political insider, am I?
rowdypilot19 said:Are you paying taxes on incentives?
It’s honestly so weird, I mean, you really have to pay taxes on all your income and earnings.
Here, have a cookie. 🍿
If you're paying tax on earnings, then those incentives count as income.
rowdypilot19 said:Man, seriously, buddy, what do you want me to say after that? Do you need me to draw you a map or something? ☕
And what’s your point? How am I supposed to consolidate anything, please tell me. I’m dealing with state-owned land covering 5 hectares while everything else is private—sometimes you get a nice 7 or 8 hectare plot, but then you hit those tiny 0.1 hectare scraps that are an absolute nightmare to work. And what are you going to do—tell the boss, "No thanks, I won't touch that"? Or suggest to the owner that you and some other guy swap plots to get something larger? The second you even bring that up, the boss will basically show you the door—or, more likely, they'll just tell you, "Fine, there's someone else who actually wants to deal with this mess," and just hand the land over to them instead...
rowdypilot19 said:Wait, hold on a second.
So if you’re looking at 225 $0.00 in subsidies, and you’re claiming it’s not actually that much, does that mean you’re basically losing money on your Wheat?
Look, if Wheat only accounts for 10% of the effort compared to a single hazelnut bush or a grapevine, then I guess you can just take me seriously.
I mean, imagine if I started lecturing you about how cucumbers and zucchini are these incredibly high-maintenance crops that require constant work... and then someone says, "Nah, just relax." Like, no way. In reality, you have to invest, otherwise, all that hard work is just wasted. I suppose that’s the part most people just can't stomach.
You could work yourself to the bone, 365 days a year, but if you don't have irrigation set up for when the plant actually needs water during a dry spell, then everything you did was basically for nothing.
I said 225 $0.00—given the amount of labor you listed, those numbers are pure nonsense. You wouldn't even hit 225 $0.00 if you went all-in on 100 hectares. Do you even realize the tax implications? Even if I actually made those 225 $0.00, once you factor in the 40% tax on a Family Farm starting from anything over 121 $0.00, it disappears. Anything below that threshold sits at 25%.
rowdypilot19 said:Wait, hold on a second.
So if you’re looking at 225 $0.00 in subsidies, and you’re claiming it’s not actually that much, does that mean you’re basically losing money on your Wheat?
Look, if Wheat only accounts for 10% of the effort compared to a single hazelnut bush or a grapevine, then I guess you can just take me seriously.
I mean, imagine if I started lecturing you about how cucumbers and zucchini are these incredibly high-maintenance crops that require constant work... and then someone says, "Nah, just relax." Like, no way. In reality, you have to invest, otherwise, all that hard work is just wasted. I suppose that’s the part most people just can't stomach.
You could work yourself to the bone, 365 days a year, but if you don't have irrigation set up for when the plant actually needs water during a dry spell, then everything you did was basically for nothing.
I’ve grown zucchini, so I know exactly what they entail. Where did I ever suggest I was losing money on Wheat unless there was some extreme weather event involved? Seriously, try and find that in my posts. Managing 1 acre of Wheat is nothing like managing 70 acres spread across 50 different plots. It's a massive undertaking. I've done zucchini twice, and I've handled 8 different field crops in the past—I still handle 7 today.
bluetinker54 said:It's always the same group complaining, usually the ones who are shady or just poor managers. Every now and then, you can blame the government or a buyer, or maybe a decent farmer who simply failed to plan ahead. Everyone else knows they just have to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.
As for subsidies, the government started this cat-and-mouse game ages ago. People got used to treating subsidies like a regular paycheck, and now that the money isn't there, they run into trouble.
Of course, it's been pointed out a hundred times that these subsidies were essentially just "handouts" rather than actual development measures.
Land is a whole other issue, and honestly, the government bears 100% of the responsibility there.
State-owned land is often leased out through very non-transparent processes, while private land is just too fragmented. Obviously, you can't force someone to sell their land to someone else, but there should have been something in place to discourage holding onto uncultivated plots. Also, the double taxation during property exchanges is a messy detail that really ought to be abolished for agricultural land.
Well, Europe was the one that pioneered these subsidies in the first place—so what, is the German or the Frenchman just an idiot? Do you actually know what the original purpose of these incentives was, or where they were first implemented?
rowdypilot19 said:Then why even grow wheat?
So, basically, you need someone to guarantee your buyback, set the price you want, provide the irrigation, give you the land for free, and bump up the subsidies.
It seems to me like it's always the same people complaining, every single year, it's a bad year. Honestly, it feels like it's just farmers complaining about everything.
Is someone forcing you to do this if it isn't profitable?
Back then, they had protection—government support, imports weren't easy, and technology wasn't where it is now.
Climate isn't a constant; it changes all the time.
You're starting with the nonsense too.
Not at all, it's always the same people complaining—the ones who expect the government to guarantee everything. Farmers, ranchers, and dairy producers.
Everyone else is doing fine, except maybe olive growers and vineyard owners; those folks in the coastal counties handle a good chunk of production.
No sane farmer (who is a professional and not just some middleman) plants crops in a monoculture. His late grandfather taught him that.
Is it just me, or does that last sentence sound kind of alarming?
That is spot on.
First off, not everyone lives right in that coastal strip 1.9 miles by the ocean. And even for those who do, most people can't find anything to rent anyway.
The stuff about farming is also totally true. Take a place like Pakoštane, for example. They used to be big into agriculture—you've got Lake Vrana nearby and the soil is incredibly fertile—but once tourism took off in the 80s, almost everyone just walked away from farming. The prices aren't worth it, and with the Ornithological Reserve being full of birds, they basically eat everything in sight. So, you end up with this really productive land just sitting there neglected, while tourism is absolutely booming.
In some spots, even just a mile away from the coast, tourists don't want to go anywhere near it... unless, I guess, you happen to own a villa with a pool.
Regarding the farming situation, my family is originally from near Pakoštane, and some of my relatives still do it—mostly vegetables along with some citrus—all alongside their tourism work. There is one cousin who actually started beekeeping, though, and he's doing really well with that.
I keep saying this, but compared to typical Midwest conditions, the plots here are just too small and scattered. Honestly, people would probably just laugh at them.
Unbelievable... where did I ever say I was complaining? I said your $225 profit estimate $0.00 was total nonsense, and yet you're turning it around on me, acting like I'm the one whining about failing. Wheat is profitable in my area—you just have to be a man to make it work.
slysurfer14 said:Growing Wheat takes about 20 working days...
I mean, you've got plowing, soil prep, seeding, fertilizing, more fertilizing after it sprouts, and finally harvesting....
That's basically it... It's probably one of the least profitable crops out there.
Three disease protections? Are we just waiting for days when the wind isn't blowing? Like, you start spraying, the wind picks up, and you have to pack it in and head home.... then there's insect control, weed control, growth regulators—and in a bad year, you might end up treating the crop four different times from planting through to maturity. Oh, and if an insect infestation hits during the heading stage? You get to spray again. And then you just have to pray to God that after you've done everything perfectly, you don't get hit by a late frost—and that the price stays at least $4.00 for Grade 3 wheat. It's not exactly a walk in the park, is it? Honestly, your take on subsidies is a bit misguided. That money would actually mean something if you weren't paying rent on the land—but where is that rent? $933 What kind of subsidy covers the cost per acre? Basically, you have to be in that lucky 5% who execute everything flawlessly just to break even—and even then, you're banking on decent rainfall and avoiding major storms. Now you'll probably tell me to "just get insurance." Well, I do, but insurance only recognizes damage if the yield drops below 5.5 tons per acre. Meanwhile, I have to chase at least 8 tons per acre just to feel like I actually made a living.
It’s not quite that simple. I'm not trying to lecture you on tourism since that's not my field. But believe me—you have far more than 20 days of work when it comes to wheat....