3. Truth be told that the IRS wants us to claim as income all the food we
consume. Since one of the key motives for the small farm, organic and self
sustaining lifestyle is to grow and eat your own food, this is a serious
intrusion into our private affairs. As a corrolary, when one of us has
replaced a window pane, did you count as income those fees you didn't have
to
pay to a professional glazier? When I change out the belts, filters and
spark
plugs on a machine, am I now saving 12 dollars an hour, which I should
count
as income? Of course, if it is an Izusu dealer, now you are "making"
$40.00/hr.
And are those food costs at retail? Boy, am I rich. Organic eggs at
$2.79/dozen? Cilantro at $1.29 a bunch? Potatoes at .89 cents/lb ? Apples
at
$1.89/lb? Please don't tell the gubment people I eat that good.
I ask:
Is this true? Is it commonly done? Steve raises very good questions? Do we
account differently for eating the tomatoes that come back from market too
soft to sell, versus those that we pick especially to slice for lunch?
What about the labor to pick them? Where does the garden stop and the farm
begin? An accountant to sort it all out, of course, would be deductable.
In general, the fuller the accounting, the better for encouraging
sustainability. Is that the case here? I bet that there is a correlation
between farms with less food eaten on the farm and less sustainable farms.
We sure could get into some very interesting issues.
What do others (especially ag economists) think?
Bill Duesing
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