Economists are now familiar with “between” and “within” group inequality decompositions, for race, gender, spatial units, etc. But what exactly is the normative significance of the empirical results produced by these decompositions? This paper raises some basic questions about policy...

With the current federal farm bill set to expire at the end of September this year, many proposals have been made to redesign the next bill. The objectives of this study are to compare the current policy with major proposed alternatives and estimate the potential payments of farmers under each...

Replaced with revised version of paper 11/24/08.

With the current federal farm bill expired as of the end of September this year, many proposals have been made to redesign the next bill. The objective of this study is to compare the current policy with major proposed alternatives by estimating the potential payments for 17 example farms in...