A bill supporters say will “level the playing field” for family farmers is being introduced in Congress. Iowa Senator Tom Harkin says the measure would reign in anti-competitive practices among big agri-businesses.Harkin says the “big four” meatpackers control 80-percent of the market. In the grain sector, he says the top four soybean crushing firms control 76 percent of the market.Harkin says the farmer’s share of the food dollar has fallen from 47-percent in 1980 to just 20-percent last year.Senator Harkin plans to introduce an amendment today to the republicans’ so-called marriage tax penalty relief bill. The Iowa democrat says the G-O-P plan gives too much money back to wealthy couples. Harkin wants to limit the tax break to couples with a combined income of 150-thousand dollars or less.Senate republicans have unveiled a ten-year, 240-billion dollar tax cut to eliminate the marriage tax penalty. That’s much larger than the 182-billion dollar plan already passed in the House.
