Grazing cattle and mowing the government

US Uncut - One of the biggest gripes from cattle ranchers like Cliven Bundy and other Western cattlemen is that the federal government is bleeding ranchers dry with overpriced cattle grazing fees. But the opposite is true — in 2012, it cost roughly $1.35 a month for each cow to graze on federal land, as opposed to the average $20 per month charged by private landowners for cattle grazing. FiveThirtyEight.com illustrated the price difference in a graph: 

 

 

If anybody is getting the raw end of the deal from the federal government’s cattle grazing prices, it’s the federal government. As of 2014, grazing fees only accounted for 15 percent of the total cost incurred for the Bureau of Land Management to manage land for cattle grazing. The other 85 percent comes from we, the taxpayers.