The relationship between farm‐level milk income over feed cost (IOFC) margin and national margin, profit risk, and terminal stress risk are investigated using data on Wisconsin dairy farms over the period 2000–2017. Results show that farm‐specific IOFC margins were not highly correlated with the national margin, higher farm IOFC margin increased profit level and volatility but decreased downside risk, and farm terminal stress appears unaffected by either the margin or the related payments. These findings suggest that, for sample farms, a policy that targets IOFC margin might reduce downside risk of net farm income.

Growth in crop yields, population, Chinese demand and biofuel production can explain important developments in world grain and oilseed markets over the last 35 years. The same indicators provide clues about what to expect between now and 2050. Proportional rates of growth in both crop yields and population are slowing. Chinese demand and biofuel production account for the entire net increase in world per-capita grain and oilseed consumption since 1980. If biofuel expansion and Chinese consumption growth slow, a key question is whether a new engine of demand growth will emerge. Decisions made by farmers, agribusinesses, policy makers and consumers will all affect future food supplies and prices. [EconLit citations: Q11, Q13, Q18] World Bank. (2008). Rising food prices: Policy options and bank responses. World Bank report.

Using wheat market support data from 55 countries for 1961-2011 from the World Bank Agricultural Distortion database, we develop a fixed effect model that shows a more complicated, nonlinear relationship between income and wheat support and its components than previously realised. We find that income generally has a greater effect on border market price support than on domestic price support. Moreover, the difference between these types of support is greater for net importers than for net exporters and has increased with the URAA or WTO accession. Holding other variables constant, the wheat support level of China, driven mainly by border market price support, is projected to rise with future income growth. Meanwhile, Japan is projected to maintain its high level of support, while the US and EU are projected to maintain their lower levels of support. These results are relevant in the context of multilateral trade negotiations, arguing against a narrow focus on past or current policy profiles and for long-run analyses that might mistakenly rest on the inconsistent assumptions of constant agricultural policies against the backdrop of rising incomes.

Abstract:We consider the bargaining problem in the context of a variable number of agents. When new agents enter the scene but the opportunities open to the enlarged group do not expand, some solutions paradoxically may recommend that some of the agents originally present gain. We propose a quantitative measure of the extent to which a solution allows this phenomenon to occur and we rank the major solutions on that basis. The Kalai-Smorodinsky solution performs better than all weakly pareto-optimal and anonymous solution, and in particular strictly better than the Nash solution. However, the two solutions are equivalent when it is the opportunities for gains offered to initial groups, instead of individuals, that are being compared.

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