ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the various economic and policy factors contributing to changing land use and value patterns, capital gains and losses on land, and the influence of land on output in the United States between 1917 and 1970. Land is treated separately as a factor of production because of its unique qualities, which derive from a relatively fixed aggregate physical supply, immobility, heterogeneity, and spatial characteristics. Throughout both time and space, land is combined with such other productive factors as labor and capital in agricultural production. Some capital serves the same purpose as land, either as a substitute for, or as an extender of, the fixed supply of land. Other capital complements land, and some combines with land as an imperfect substitute or, viewed alternatively, as an imperfect complement.
