It is true that the U.S. used to subsidize dairy heavily – but no more. In fact, the U.S. has in recent years dramatically reduced its own subsidization of dairy. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD’s) 2017 Market Price Support Estimates (MPSEs) for Milk, Canada’s dairy subsidy is seven times greater than in the US.1 Another measure is the OECD’s “per cent producer single commodity transfers” (%PSCT). This reflects the annual monetary value of gross transfers from consumer and taxpayers to agricultural producers, measured at the farm gate level. This includes, therefore, all types of “support from a wide variety of sources.” (In the U.S. for example, this would include product bought by the government for school lunch programs, etc.)
Ten years ago (2007), the %PSCT for Canada for milk was already almost twice that for the U.S. (40.04 versus 24.32). But even more important is that since then, the level of U.S. %PSCT for milk was cut almost in half – to only 12.85 (2016) – whereas the Canadian %PSCT increased to 44.13.
Using either measure, Canada’s subsidization of milk production is far higher than that of the U.S.: Canadian MPSE at seven times greater than the U.S.; or the Canadian %PSCT at 3.5 times greater than the U.S. It is nonsense for Canada to complain that we cannot compete with U.S. subsidization.