Grazing Subsidies as Rent Scheme

Federal grazing on 240M acres now operates less like a land‑management program and more like a targeted, institutionalized rent‑transfer: low permit fees, taxpayer‑funded infrastructure, and legal/back‑channel protection combine to lock in appropriations to a concentrated industry while externalizing ecological costs. The political durability of the system rests on local power networks, agency permitting practices, and legal carve‑outs that make reform technically feasible but politically fraught. — Framing public‑lands grazing as an explicit rent‑transfer clarifies who benefits, who pays, and what kinds of legal/administrative levers (fee reform, auctioning permits, audit of agency practices) would materially change outcomes.