farmer4321 - 11/24/2018 14:10

If I missed the peak I didn't miss it by much and I'd rather miss the peak by small amount than to miss it by bunch. As for this forester, he prepares & lets bids every week so I assume he knows the prices and market conditions, I'm reporting what he said. And he said it was due to the trade war. Can you still sell timber at advantage? I'm sure, depending on species and quality, you can. But if you don't happen to have those species and quality maybe you can't.
But you seem to miss my point entirely, there are people who though no fault of their own have been put at a serious economic disadvantage and are being asked to absorb the loss by the political leadership. Worse yet, it's very likely that even if the trump administration is successful, these people who take these loses will never recover those losses. Even if China & the US settles, the Chinese aren't going to just say, "sorry, no hard feelings" and go back to buying US soybeans like before. They will very likely make it a policy to avoid US soybeans as much as possible.
Ask yourself this question, if US soybean producers or landowners of timber had known that they were going to be targeted so directly by trump, would they have voted so readily for him in the last election? I'll bet they wouldn't have. Why? Because people generally put the economy, particularly their economy first when it comes to politics, as they should.