Defining appropriate probability distributions for the variables in an economic model is an important and often arduous task. This paper evaluates the performance of several common probability distributions under different distributional assumptions when sample sizes are small and there is...

Often analysts must conduct risk analysis based on a small number of observations. This paper describes and illustrates the use of a kernel density estimation procedure to smooth out irregularities in such a sparse data set for simulating univariate and multivariate probability distributions.

Replaced with revised version of paper 02/04/08.

The probability of success for an immigrating Dutch dairy farmer was analyzed using a whole farm simulation model. Data used to simulate the U.S. farms came from the AFPC's database of representative U.S. dairies and projected mean annual prices from FAPRI. Data on the Dutch dairy used for...

Evaluating the risk of a particular decision depends on the risk aversion of the decision maker related to the underlying utility function. The objective of this paper is to use stochastic efficiency with respect to a function (SERF) to compare the ranking of risky alternatives using alternative...

Three marketing strategies (selling a put option, cash sale at harvest, and cash sale in June) are simulated based on historical values and ranked based on certainty equivalents for a representative irrigated and dryland cotton farm Scenario analysis is also used to compare varying yield values.

A recent paper by Hardaker et al. (The Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 48, 2004a, 253) and book by Hardaker et al. (Coping with Risk in Agriculture, 2004b) describe a procedure for determining an efficient set from among a set of random alternatives. This procedure,...