An examination of the state of the art in the classification of farms indicates a need for more work. Classification of farms by size has been widely used and found serviceable. In a capitalistic social system, such as the United States, the most appropriate measure of the relative contributions of farms of different sizes appears to be the market value of products they sell. Accordingly, a preliminary generic typology of U.S. farms, based on published data, is proposed in which Mainline, Marginal, and Peripheral types are identified
