In recent years, direct payments — a type of farm commodity program payment — have made up a large share of Federal agriculture assistance that could be withheld from farmers who fail to comply with highly erodible land conservation (conservation compliance and sodbuster) or wetland...

Various risks affect the income and the welfare of farm households. A large number of strategies are available to deal specifically with income risk. They exist against a general background of widespread government intervention that modifies the risks faced by farmers. In the context of...