CAN PRICE SUPPORTS NEGATE THE SOCIAL GAINS FROM PUBLIC RESEARCH EXPENDITURES IN AGRICULTURE?

Harry de Gorter () and Johan Swinnen

No 6881, Working Papers from Cornell University, Department of Applied Economics and Management

Abstract: The burgeoning literature on how the benefits from research may be negative for a given price support arbitrarily ignores the costs of price supports for a given level of research. Furthermore, the very existence of price supports is inconsistent with the normative criterion that governments simply maximize social income. We show that there are always gains from research, even if governments maximize social income subject to a farm income goal. Our results are also consistent with the statements made by Schultz and Ruttan that ignoring price supports will result in all over (or under) valuation of research benefits. Finally, we indicate that the predictions of the "no gains from research" literature may not be substantiated by empirical evidence and that the ideal normative model should include endogenous farm income levels as well.

Keywords: Demand and Price Analysis; Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 31
Date: 1994
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/6881/files/wp940006.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:cudawp:6881

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.6881

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Cornell University, Department of Applied Economics and Management Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by AgEcon Search ().