Factors in the Decline of the Western Sheep Industry

C. Kerry Gee, Richard S. Magleby, Darwin B. Nielsen and Delwin M. Stevens

No 305697, Agricultural Economic Reports from United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service

Abstract: Former sheep producers in Colorado, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming were surveyed to determine why they had discontinued sheep production. From 40 to 60 percent were found to have continued in some form of agricultural business, usually involving cattle. The others had retired or taken off-farm employment. Generally, the former sheep producers had smaller scale operations, more equity in the business, higher predation losses, lower earnings, and were older than producers continuing in the sheep business. Factors which they rated of greatest importance in their decisions to discontinue sheep production were high predation losses, low lamb and wool prices, shortage of good hired labor, and their own age.

Keywords: Labor and Human Capital; Livestock Production/Industries (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 37
Date: 1977-08
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/305697/files/aer377.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:uerser:305697

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.305697

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Agricultural Economic Reports from United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by AgEcon Search ().