AGRI-ENVIRONMENTAL PROGRAMS IN THE UNITED STATES AND THE EUROPEAN UNION

Agricultural and Food Policy, Environmental Economics and Policy,

CONTRACT MARKET VIABILITY

Academia and the finance industry generate many proposals for new contract markets. Unfortunately, many proposed markets lack the critical attributes that promote success. We examine these attributes, and evaluate the potential of several announced proposals. We find that proposals emanating from the academy generally fail to consider the full suite of integrated financial services necessary to support a viable market, while proposals put forward by practitioners are much more likely to do so.Marketing,

FEDERAL GRAZING REFORM AND AVOIDABLE RISK

Recent rangeland reform attempts have increased ranchers'Â’ uncertainty of retaining grazing permits on federal land. This uncertainty is analyzed with a model of grazing on federal land. Ranchers facing this uncertainty will behave differently than if they were guaranteed the renewal of grazing permits at constant real grazing fees. It is shown that the socially optimal outcome may be achieved by adding avoidable risk through targeted rangeland reform. Rangeland reform attempts that create unavoidable risk can make both ranchers and environmental groups worse off.Agricultural and Food Policy,

Endogenous Policy Theory: The Political Structure and Policy Formation

Models of economic systems involving government intervention by definition include some policy variables, or policy instruments, through which the policy in implemented. In general, economists have tended to view these variables as exogenously given. While convenient in dealing with some analytical problems, this attitude is not always adequate, as it abstracts from the realities of political-economic life. Evidently, economic policy is not independent of the economic structure, and policy variables are codetermined with endogenous economic variables within an integrated political-economic structure

THE DISTRIBUTIONAL EFFECTS OF LAND CONTROLS IN AGRICULTURE

The paper introduces a framework for analyzing the impacts of land control programs on agricultural production under heterogenous land qualities, heterogenous production technologies and imperfect capital markets. It shows that the introduction of diversion programs tends to benefit land owners while harming operators. Moreover, it tends to increase the separation of land ownership and operation and increase concentration among operators. Diversion programs tend to raise land prices lass than proportional to the increases in rental rates. They encourage the adoption of yield increasing technologies, and may also encourage adoption of cost reducing technologies when credit is a binding constraint. Participation in voluntary government programs tends to be greater in regions with higher costs, less efficient marginal technology and less efficient marginal land.Land Economics/Use,

Prescription: Political Preference Functions Versus Social Welfare Functions

Available evidence taken from the experience of many countries strongly suggests that bad governments and institutions have been serious, if not the most serious, obstacle to economic growth; and all public sectors pursue a mix of both predatory and productive activities—bad governments emphasizing the former, and good governments finding a way of promoting the latter. Depending on your perspective, unfortunately or fortunately, participants in the public-sector policy process generally pay little attention to the advice and counsel of the economics profession. This, in part, is explained by the confusion that emerges from our profession over the role of the public sector. Some would have us believe that the government, or the public sector, is nothing more than a clearing house while still others advance frameworks that treat the public sector as a benign pursuer of the public interest

ntraorganizational Influence Relations and the Optimality of Collective Action

Collective action, although often superior to anarchy, tends to be socially suboptimal even when the proclivity of free riders to defect is fully controlled and an organization for collective action is set up. An effective organization for collective action involving many participants will likely feature a coordinating center and peripheral participants. Even if all the overall group objective is fully internalized by the center, the organizational equilibrium is suboptimal as it reflects the influence of narrowly rational peripheral participants. The efficiency loss is particularly evident on collective action over time, where group choices even within a single generation are likely to be myopic—a propensity further exacerbated by the center\u27s short planning horizon

DO QUALITY INCENTIVES MATTER?

We utilize an unusual data set, involving fifteen tomato growers over four years, to analyze the impact of incentive contracts on behavior. Each grower delivers processing tomatoes under a price incentives contract and for a fixed price per ton. Our comparison of the quality of the tomatoes delivered under the two arrangements confirms that growers do respond to incentive contracts by improving tomato quality, as predicted by economic theory. The comparison is not confounded by the usual contract endogeneity and simultaneity problems, due to characteristics of the processing tomato industry and our data set.Tomatoes, marketing, quality incentives, purchasing contracts, Marketing,