The US Farm Bill of 2002 is the latest in a 7-decade history of farm subsidy laws that transfer funds to farmers and regulate and subsidize production of selected commodities. Fruit, tree nut, ornamental and vegetable crops, hay and meats remain outside scope of main subsidy programs. The new...

Country of origin labeling (COOL) is a common practice. It occurs routinely for many products in many places, but the US implementation of mandatory COOL for meat, whose purpose is to identify the origin of the livestock used to produce the meat, generated much controversy and a major WTO...

After several years of informal and formal negotiations, South Korea and the United States reached an agreement to move towards free trade in April 2007. Currently, both countries await congressional approval before the agreement can be implemented. This study explains the substance of the...

More open international markets benefit the economy as a whole, as well as most U.S. agricultural producers. The Uruguay Round Agreement laid out a useful framework. Specifically addressed here is why the key to further liberalizing agricultural trade is reduction of tariffs as comprehensively...

In the policy arena, there is a demand for "trade distortion indicators", but many of the traditional indices are difficult to compute and interpret. Recent developments in the literature have led to a new indicator: the Trade Restrictiveness Index (TRI). This paper analyzes some problems...

There has been a rapid increase in recent years in invasive species and animal management economic research. Expanded interest in the topic has been partially driven by the practical importance of public policy to deal effectively with invasive species, given its public good aspects. This paper...