That's part of what I wanted to say, but you say it so much better.  Being a farmer is a vocation for many, and most I know continue farming until they die, even if it ends up costing them money.  Its a way of life and they don't know of any other way.  But I think the wider community also benefits greatly from this connectedness with the soil.  

Urban man lives by supermarket ready meals where all connection with the soil is lost.  But that sort of point is treated as mystical mumbo jumbo or special pleading by an interest group by the neo-lib reformers.  I would hate to live in a society without a vibrant rural life and agricultural sector.  But then I'm biased.  I grew up and live there.

notes from no w here