The US animal insurance program: Rapid expansion at a growing cost to taxpayers (AEI) 

AEI published an op-ed by senior research fellow Joseph Glauber who made several key points on livestock insurance and how taxpayers are eating the costs of that insurance more and more. Unlike crop insurance, which indemnifies producers based on production or revenue losses, livestock insurance protects producers against declines in futures prices for livestock products or against declines in futures price margins between output and input products (for example, feed costs). The recent rapid growth in participation in the federal livestock program raises concerns that the cost to taxpayers of insuring livestock may far exceed what the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecasted when the expenditure cap was removed from the program.US livestock product exports have grown significantly in recent years, and such support potentially exposes US exports to challenges by foreign suppliers through the dispute settlement mechanism at the World Trade Organization.