Modeled after estate tax legislation
Tobacco Buyout Favors Big Growers
By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 22, 2004; Page A02
More than two-thirds of the $9.6 billion tobacco-grower buyout approved by the House would go to only 10 percent of the people and companies eligible for any compensation, according to a study by the nonprofit Environmental Working Group.
The buyout of tobacco growers and holders of government "quota" rights to market tobacco would give at least $1 million to 463 companies, individuals or estates, the report found, and would provide more than $8 million to one North Carolina company.
The study, based on information from the Department of Agriculture obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and scheduled to be released today, showed that the overwhelming majority of recipients -- 354,000 of the 437,000 eligible -- would collect only $1,000 a year over five years.
"The House buyout plan is an incredible rip-off of the taxpayer, mostly to benefit a handful of large tobacco interests and tobacco companies," said Ken Cook, president of the research and advocacy group.
"I really didn't think the control of tobacco quotas would be so concentrated because I had heard and half-swallowed the rhetoric of this being about small farmers," he said. "But this is no different than with commodities like cotton and rice, where the big players control a huge part of the industry."
