Big Ag Tobacco is an Example of Bad Policy

I am not a smoker but not a teetotaler, so here's the article.  It is interesting to note that Wendell Berry was a tobacco farmer as his family before him and believed deeply in sustainability and the nobility of good old fashioned values held by small family farmers. This article chronicles the demise of these farmer.

You might be surprised to learn that well into the 1990s, tobacco production was a hidden hold out of profitable small-scale family operated agriculture, especially in Appalachia and the Piedmont plateau. In 1987, the average tobacco farm was just 4.6 acres, and run mostly with family labor.

That of course changed with our state policy mantra of "Get Big or Get Out."

http://www.foodandpower.net/2019/09/26/the-forgotten-history-of-small-scale-american-tobacco-farming/