Are Farm Size Distributions Bimodal? Evidence from Kernel Density Estimates of Dairy Farm Size Distributions

One often hears and sees reference to bimodal distributions of farm size. This notion seems to have become one of the stylized facts about American agriculture. Dairy farm size distributions are prime candidates to exhibit a bimodal size distribution. Older dairy farms tend to be significantly smaller than new dairy farms and there are well known regional size differences. Nonetheless, our analysis of 1989 and 1993 U.S. dairy farm size distributions, using nonparametric density estimation techniques, reveals that U.S. dairy farm size distributions are not bimodal. This result holds across years for herd size, total farm sales, and acres operated. Copyright 2001, Oxford University Press.