00:00In the Depression, farmers were producing plenty of food, but no one could afford to buy it.
00:04So farmers started going out of business.
00:07Under the Farm Bill, Uncle Sam paid farmers not to grow so many crops.
00:12By keeping supply down, the bill kept prices steady for the farmers.
00:18But after World War II, things began to change.
00:22New farming chemicals led to bigger harvests, and new petroleum-fueled machines were created to keep up with the surge.
00:31Starvation was history, but the explosion of food into the marketplace overwhelmed the government's ability to manage supply and demand.
00:40In the 1970s, Secretary of Agriculture Earl Butz had a different idea.
00:46In a complete 180, the government abandoned small farmers in favor of large mega-farms that could churn out as much food as possible.
00:56All we had to do was find someone to eat this avalanche of cheap, low-quality food.
01:02In just two generations, a nation wracked by hunger ate its way into obesity, diabetes, and all sorts of other problems.
01:09In just two generations, a nation wracked by hunger ate its way into obesity, diabetes, and all sorts of other problems.
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