USDA spends over $5 billion per year on conservation activities, mostly through voluntary programs that pay farmers and landowners to provide environmental services. USDA can reduce expenditures and encourage landowners to provide greater environmental services by making use of available data....

The U.S. Department of Agriculture spends over $5 billion per year on conservation programs, mostly on voluntary programs that give financial assistance to farmers and landowners to provide environmental services (such as implementing nutrient management programs or planting native grasses)....

An early-warning system generates economic value to the extent that it improves decision making. The value of the information hinges on the degree to which a timely response, aided by warnings, facilitates successful damage mitigation. USDA's Coordinated Framework for Soybean Rust includes a...

Farmer bankruptcies, bankruptcy rates, and related issues are explored from the beginning of modern bankruptcy legislation over a century ago. Farmer bankruptcies historically have been controversial because they are thought to indicate changes in the economic well-being and structure of the...

The Federal Medicare program provides subsidized health insurance for one in every seven Americans. Medicare covers a higher proportion of rural than urban residents because rural residents are more likely to be elderly or disabled persons entitled to benefits. The rapid growth of Medicare...

The number of farms and other estates that must pay Federal estate taxes has increased in recent years. Concerns about this increase and its effect on farms and other small businesses have generated a number of proposals to change Federal estate tax laws. Some proposals would affect only farms...

This report describes a farm typology developed by the Economic Research Service (ERS), which categorizes farms into more homogeneous groups than classifications based on sales volume alone, producing a more effective policy development tool. The typology is used to describe U.S. farm structure.