In the last thirty years, total farm production in the United States has increased by eighty percent while at the same time this abundance has required less labor, capital, and physical resources to implement. This increase in farm production has been accompanied by major environmental improvements. New technologies have limited the environmental damage usually associated with greater production volume. During this period, the shift from conventional tillage to no tillage has reduced erosion. Most modern chemicals and fertilizers now break down in short periods with the application of sunlight. Larger field equipment and advanced technologies speed up planting and harvesting. The shorter soil disturbance times and the high yields leave a smaller footprint on the natural landscape, giving more room and time for wildlife to thrive. Today's high technology-oriented, high-yield, intensive agriculture environment was a direct result of a property-rights based system of land ownership that has also reflected the participation of heavy government investment (Hosemann, 2002).
Agriculture has existed in the United States in a private property setting. This is one reason for its success. Over the past thirty years, the federal government has increased its role in farming through various subsidies and the regulation of land, water and air. Money has been transferred from taxpayers to farmers to keep farm income higher than could have reasonably been obtained through the normal dynamics of the marketplace. Over this period, an estimated $275 billion federal dollars have been "invested" in U.S. farmers while during the same period an estimated $85 billion has been provided to support agricultural research in the public university environment (Hosemann, 2002). While most of the government farm subsidy programs were originally adopted to preserve the "family farm" environment, most of these monies have been applied to large commercial farming...