Recognition of the potentially deleterious implications of high inequality of opportunity due to a biased asset distribution has led to increased interest in land reforms. However, little attention has been devoted to the potential longer-term impacts of the measures used to implement such...

Threshold autoregressive (TAR) models can accommodate the asymmetric cycling behavior observed in some time series data. This study develops a procedure to estimate TAR models when the conditional mean of the dependent variable is function of one or more exogenous factors while allowing for...

Replaced with revised version of paper 06/26/06.

Very little attention has been given to the modeling of yield distribution for crops and regions in which yields exhibit irregular behavior. We undertake a statistical case study of Texas upland cotton and propose an alternative mixture distribution based on regime-switching model in which the...

This study examines various market contracting combinations for Salinas Valley Head Lettuce Producers to determine the optimal combination. Currently 65% contracting is the industry standard. A stochastic farm simulation model is developed for a representative head lettuce producer in Salinas...

This study explores the prevalence and determinants of brand loyalty for agricultural input products. Results suggest that loyalty for both expendable and capital inputs is high among commercial farmers. Farmer attitudes, beliefs, and some demographic characteristics are useful identifiers of...

This paper uses Federal LandBank Data to examine loan characteristics and farm financial characteristics. Given that farm financial characteristics and loan interest rates can change, this paper examines if current farm financial characteristics can predict the current loan interest rate. In...

EPA-sponsored voluntary pollution reduction programs (VPR) have gained increased prominence in U.S. environmental policy. However, as commitments to these programs are not enforceable by design, the empirical literature has mostly focused on studying the motives for their adoption and their...

This paper examines the impact of the U.S.-Mexico trade agreement under NAFTA. The results suggest that U.S. agricultural imports from Mexico have been responsive to tariff rate reductions applied to Mexican products. A 1 percent decrease in tariff rates is associated with an increase in U.S....

Replaced with revised version of paper 07/20/06.