ABSTRACT
Bruce Gardner's main conclusion is that US commodity programs no longer increase US output. Thus, the implications of the policies for trading partners such as the economic community should be reassuring. The basic elements leading to Gardner’s conclusions are: first, a large proportion of US cropland is currently being idled; second, there are no program-specific incentives to overproduce on the land being harvested because program yields are frozen. Gardner’s regression of harvested acres on idled acres provides evidence of “acreage slippage,” as he correctly notes. On the whole, however, Gardner appears on sound grounds in arguing that the acreage reduction effect dominates so that, ceteris paribus, output of program crops at present is being negatively affected by commodity programs. Gardner’s analysis of the potential impact of emerging environmental regulations attacks a potentially important new dimension of US policies affecting agriculture, and his detailed exposition of the main issues in this matter are useful.
