Unpacking the Agricultural Black Box: The Rise and Fall of American Farm Productivity Growth

Philip G. Pardey and Julian Alston

No 342428, Staff Papers from University of Minnesota, Department of Applied Economics

Abstract: Has the golden age of U.S. agricultural productivity growth ended? We analyze the detailed patterns of productivity growth spanning a century of profound changes in American agriculture. We document a substantial slowing of U.S. farm productivity growth, following a late mid-century surge—20 years after the surge and slowdown in U.S. industrial productivity growth. We posit and empirically probe three related explanations for this farm productivity surge-slowdown: the time path of agricultural R&D-driven knowledge stocks; a big wave of technological progress associated with great clusters of inventions; and dynamic aspects of the structural transformation of agriculture, largely completed by 1980.

Keywords: Productivity Analysis; Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 117
Date: 2024-05-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr, nep-eff, nep-his and nep-inv
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Journal Article: Unpacking the Agricultural Black Box: The Rise and Fall of American Farm Productivity Growth (2021)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:umaesp:342428

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.342428

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