We study how increases in wealth from rapid appreciation of farmland influenced farmer decisions to borrow, buy land, and expand. Exploiting periods of high and low appreciation and a panel data model that allows for correlation between prior growth trends and the share of land owned, we find...

We examine the persistence of cropland retirements induced by the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), the largest U.S. conservation program. We analyze micro data on observed land-use choices following CRP contract expiration over 1995–1997 and predict that 42% of CRP acres would not have been...

The studies in this report analyze the effects of decoupled payments in the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform (FAIR) Act on recipient households, and assess land, labor, risk management, and capital market conditions that can lead to links between decoupled payments and production...

This report estimates the impact that high levels of enrollment in the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) have had on economic trends in rural counties since the program's inception in 1985 until today. The results of a growth model and quasi-experimental control group analysis indicate no...