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Agricultural Economics Chicago Suggested Reading Syllabus

Chicago. Assigned Readings for Price and Income Instability. T. W. Schultz, 1956

Beginning in 1957 Zvi Griliches took over the course at Chicago on Price and Income Instability with special reference to agriculture. The course was previously taught by T. W. Schultz. In his files for the course Griliches kept a copy of the course outline and readings for the Spring 1956 quarter taught by his predecessor.

There were 86 numbered items on Schultz’s reading list that he referenced by the item number with chapter/page selections for some of the items. You will have to jump down from the course outline to the list of course readings and back, which I find a very peculiar way to present a course outline, but it didn’t keep him from getting a Nobel prize in economics in 1979.

_________________________

T. W. Schultz
University of Chicago

Economics 355 B
Price and Income Instability

(as problems in economic organization with special reference to agriculture)

Economics 355 B will cover the following classes of problems:

      1. general characteristics of policies and programs which are related to agriculture.
      2. analysis of the price and income instability that confronts agriculture.
      3. alternative measures for reducing or accommodating price and income instability.
      4. some research proposals directed to this set of problems.
  1. General characteristics of policies and programs for agriculture by types of countries and during different periods.

(to be developed in class)

  1. Analysis of price and income instability that confronts agriculture.

38, chs. 4, 5, 6, 7, 10;
55, chs, 11 and 20.

    1. Instability of the economy as a whole.

19;
5;
23;
50;
67;
44.

    1. Particular instabilities of farm product prices during the stock period.

45: pp. 14-15, 65-66, 76-77;
31, Ch. 2;
10: pp. 42-44;
51.

      1. Producer supply schedule for stock period.

(1) Farm household activities.

55, ch. 14;
49, ch. 6.

(2) Farm-firm activities.

55, ch. 14;
68, ch. 2.

      1. Demand schedule confronting producers restricted to stock period.

55, ch. 11;
68, ch. 2.

      1. Spot and forward markets.

38, ch. 10;
27;
42;
43;
32;
37;
28;
29;
6;
14;
54;
58;
69;
70.

    1. Particular instabilities of farm product prices for time intervals longer than stock period (up to and including two production periods).
      1. Planned and unplanned variations in production (supply).

55, chs. 11, 12, 13;
40;
68, ch. 2.4;
12;
11;
1;
2b;
65;
13;
16;
61;
66.

      1. Shifts in demand schedule during relatively short periods.

55, ch. 11;
12;
68, ch. 2;
71;
8;
9;
17;
18;
22;
46;
56;
57;
59;
62;
63;
64.

  1. Measures for reducing or accommodating farm product prices and income instability.

7;
44;
67;
26, pp. 247-252.

    1. Particular abrupt and large shifts in the demand schedule.

55, pp. 344-346.

    1. Large year to year changes in production.

55, ch. 19;
38, ch. 13;
2b;
3;
4;
15;
24;
25;
30;
34;
35;
36;
41;
48;
52;
53;
60.

    1. Increasing the price elasticity of the relevant schedules.

55, pp. 349-358.

    1. By way of accommodation.

55, pp. 358-366.

      1. Farms with more capacity to cope with price and income instability.
      2. Possibilities by storage.
      3. Safeguarding income during depressions.
  1. Some research proposals

(to be based on III and the research interest of the student)

_________________________

T. W. Schultz
Spring, 1956

Economics 355 B
List of Readings

  1. Barber, Lloyd, “Variability of Wheat Yields by Counties in the United States,” BAE (September, 1951).
  2. (a) Barber, E. Lloyd, “Summerfallowing to Meet Weather Risks in Wheat Farming,” Agricultural Economics Research, III (October, 1951).
  1. (b) Barton, Glen T. and Cooper, Martin R., “Relation of Agricultural Production to Inputs,” Review of Economics and Statistics, XXX (May, 1948).
  2. Barber, E. Lloyd and Thair, Philip J., “Institutional Methods of Meeting Weather Uncertainty in the Great Plains,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXII (August, 1950).
  3. Barber, E. Lloyd, Meeting Weather Risks in Kansas Wheat Farming, Kansas Agr. Ext. Sta. and BAE Agr. Report 44 (September, 1950).
  4. Bennett, M. K. and Associates, International Commodity Stockpiling as an Economic Stabilizer (Stanford: Stanford Univ. Press, 1949).
  5. Blau, G., “Some Aspects of the Theory of Futures Trading,” The Review of Economic Studies, XI (1943-44).
  6. Brownlee, O. H. and Johnson, D. Gale, “Reducing Price Variability Confronting Primary Producers,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXII (May, 1950).
  7. Burk, Marguerite, “Recent Relationships between Income and Food Expenditure,” Agricultural Economics Research, BAE, III (July, 1951).
  8. ___________, “Changes in the Demand for Food from 1941 to 1950,” Journal of Farm Economics,” XXXIII (August, 1951).
  9. Clark, Colin, Conditions of Economic Progress, 2nd ed, (London: Macmillan, 1951).
  10. Cochrane, Willard W., An Analysis of Farm Price Behavior, Progress Report Agricultural Experinent Station, Pennsylvania State College (May, 1951)
  11. ___________, “Farm Price Gyrations — An Aggregative Hypothesis,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXIX (May, 1947).
  12. Day, Emily L. and Barber, Lloyd, Physical Risks in Farm Production, Selected References, 1930-1948. USDA Library, List 49 (August, 1949).
  13. Dow, J. C. R., “A Theoretical Account of Futures Markets,” The Review of Economic Studies, VII (1939-40).
  14. Ellickson, John C., “Hail Insurance on Growing Crops in the United States,” Agricultural Finance Review, BAE, XIII (November, 1950).
  15. Foote, Richard J. and Bean, Louis H., “Are Yearly Variations in CropYield Random?” BAE, Agricultural Economics Research, III (January, 1951).
  16. Fox, Karl A., “Factors Affecting Farm Income, Farm Prices and FoodConsumption,” Agricultural Economics Research, III (July, 1951).
  17. ___________ and Norcross, Harry C., “Agriculture and the General Economy,” Agricultural Economics Research, IV (January, 1952).
  18. Friedman, Milton, “Commodity-Reserve Currency,” Journal of Political Economy. LIX (June, 1951).
  19. Galbraith, John K., American Capitalism—The Concept of Countervailing Power (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1952).
  20. Galbraith, John K., “Economic Preconceptions and Farm Policy,” American Economic Review, XLIV (March, 1954).
  21. Girschick, M. A. and Haavelmo, T., “Statistical Analysis of the Demand forFood,” Econometrica, XV (April, 1947).
  22. Graham, Benjamin, Storage and Stability (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1937).
  23. Halcrow, Harold G., “Actuarial Structure of Crop Insurance,”Journal of Farm Economics, XXXI (August, 1949).
  24. ___________, The Theory of Crop Insurance, Ph.D. Thesis, University of Chicago, 1948.
  25. Haley, Bernard F. (ed.), A Survey of Contemporary Economics, Vol. I (Homewood, Ill.: Richard D. Irwin, 1952).
  26. Hardy, C. O., “Recent Developments in the Theory of Speculation,” American Economic Review, XXVII (1937).
  27. ___________ and Lyon, L. S., “The Theory of Hedging,” Journal of Political Economy, XXXI (1923).
  28. Hawtrey, R. G., “Mr. Kaldor on the Forward Market,” The Review of Economic Studies, VIII (1940-41).
  29. Heisig, Carl P., “Income Instabillty in High Risk Farming Areas,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXVIII (1946).
  30. Hicks, J. R., Value and Capital (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1939).
  31. Hicks, J. R., “Theory of Uncertainty and Profit,” Economica, VI (1939).
  32. Hoos, Sidney,“Relations between Agricultural Price Policy and MarketingResearch,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXIII (August, 1951).
  33. Horton, Donald C., “Adaptation of the Farm Capital Structure to Uncertainty,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXI (February, 1949).
  34. ___________, The Pattern of Farm Financial Structure, National Bureau of Economic Research, a preliminary draft (May, 1951).
  35. ___________ and Barber, E. Lloyd, “The Problem of Farm Business Survival in Areas of Highly Variable Rainfall,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXI, Proceedings (November, 1942).
  36. Houthakker, H. S., “A Proposed Inquiry into Some Markets with Forward Trading,” Cowles Commission Discussion Paper Economics 2036 and Agricultural Economics Research Paper No. 5211, March 21, 1952. Mimeo.
  37. Johnson, D. Gale, Forward Prices for Agriculture (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1947).
  38. ___________, Trade and Agriculture: A Study of Inconsistent Policies (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1950).
  39. ___________, “The Nature of the Supply Function for American Agriculture,” American Economic Review, XL (September, 1950).
  40. Jones, Lloyd E.,“Stabilizing Farming by Shifting Wheat Land to Grass in Northern Great Plains,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXII (August, 1950).
  41. Kaldor, N., “A Note on the Theory of the Forward Market,”The Review of Economic Studies, VII (1939-40).
  42. ___________, “Speculation and Economic Stability,” The Review of Economic Studies, VII (1939-40).
  43. Keynes, J. M., “The Policy of Government Storage of Food-Stuffs and Raw Materials,” Economic Journal, XLVIII (September, 1938).
  44. Knight, Frank H., The Economic Organization (New York: Augustus M. Kelley, 1951).
  45. Mack, Ruth P., “The Direction of Change in Income and the Consumption Function,” Review of Economics and Statistics, XXX (1948).
  46. Mehrens, George L., “Comparative Costs of Agricultural Price Supportsin 1949,” Proceedings, American Economic Review, XLI (May, 1951).
  47. Nebraska Agr. Exp. Sta., Toward Stability in the Great Plains Economy, Proceedings of a conference held at Custer, South Dakota in 1949. Agr. Exp. Sta. Bul. 399 (July, 1950).
  48. Reid, M. G., Food for People (New York: Wiley, 1943).
  49. Reifler, Winfield, “A Proposal for an International Buffer-Stock Agency,” Journal of Political Economy, LIV (December, 1946).
  50. Robbins, Lionel,“Elasticity of Demand for Income in Terms of Effort,” Economica (1930).
  51. Schickele, Rainer, “Farm Business Survival under Extreme Weather Risk,”Journal of Farm Economics, XXXI (November, 1949),
  52. ___________, “Farmers Adaptation to Income Uncertainty,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXII (August, 1950).
  53. Schultz, T. W., Production and Welfare of Agriculture (New York: Macmillan, 1949).
  54. ___________, The Economic Organization of Agriculture (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1953).
  55. Schultz, Henry, The Theory and Measurement of Demand (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1938).
  56. ___________, “The Shifting Demand for Selected Agricultural Commodities, 1875-1929,” Journal of Farm Economics, XIV (April, 1932).
  57. Stewart, Blair, An Analysis of Speculative Trading in Grain Futures, USDA Commodity Exchange Authority, Bul. No. 1001. October, 1942.
  58. Stone, J. R. K., “Analysis of Market Demand,” Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, CVIII (1945).
  59. Thair, Philip J., Stabilizing Farm Income against Crop Yield Fluctuations, Agr. Exp. Sta. North Dakota and BAE Bul. 362, September, 1950).
  60. Timoshenko, P., “Variability in Wheat Yields and Outputs, Part I. Cycles or Random Fluctuations,” Wheat Studies of the Food Research Institute, XVIII (Stanford, California, 1942).
  61. Tintner, Gerhard,“Multiple Regression for System of Equations,” Econometrics, XIV (January, 1946).
  62. Tobin, James,“A Statistical Demand Function for Food in the U.S.A.,” Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, CXIII (1950), Part II.
  63. U.S.D.A., BAE, Consumption of Food in the United States, 1909-48, Misc. Pub. 691 (August, 1949).
  64. U.S.D.A., BAE, Farm Production Practices, Costs and Returns, Stat. Bul. 83 (October, 1949).
  65. U.S.D.A., Fluctuations in Crops and Weather, 1866-1948, Stat. Bul. 101 (June, 1951).
  66. Viner, Jacob, “International Finance in the Post-War World,”Lloyds Bank Review (October, 1946).
  67. Waugh, Frederick V., Readings in Agricultural Marketing (Ames: Iowa State College Press, 1954).
  68. Williams, J. B., “Speculation and the Carryover,” The Quarterly Journal of Economics, LI (1936).
  69. Working, H. “Theory of the Inverse Carrying Charge in Futures Markets,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXX (1948).
  70. Working, E. J., “Appraising the Demand for American Agricultural Output during Rearmament,” Journal of Farm Economics XXXIV, May, 1952.
Supplementary List #1
  1. Bauer, P. T., West African Trade (Cambridge: The University Press, 1954), esp. Parts 3, 5, and 6.
  2. ___________ and Paish, F. , “The Reduction of Fluctuations in the Incomes of Primary Producers,” Economic Journal, LXII (December, 1952).
  3. ___________, “The Reduction of Fluctuations in the Incomes of Primary Producers Further Considered,” Economic Journal, LXIV, (December, 1954).
  4. Friedman, Milton, “The Reduction of Fluctuations in the Incomes of Primary Producers: A Critical Comment, Economic Journal, LXIV (December 1954).
  5. Gustafson, Robert L.,Optimal Carryover Rules for Grains, The University of Chicago RMA Study (January 31, 1954). Agricultural Economics Research Paper).
  6. Heady, Earl O., Kehrberg, Earl W., and Jebe, Emil B., Economic Instability and Choices Involving Income and Risk in Primary or Crop Production, Res. Bul. 404 (January, 1954) Agric. Exp. Iowa State College.
  7. Heady, Earl, “Diversification in Resource Allocation and Minimization of Income Variability,” Journal of Farm Economics XXXIV (November, 1952).
  8. Johnson, D. Gale, “Competition in Agriculture: Fact or Fiction?”American Economic Review, Papers and Proceedings XLIV (May, 1954).
  9. Kaldor, Donald R. and Heady, Earl O., An Exploratory Study of Expectations, Uncertainty and Farm Plans in Southern Iowa Agriculture, Res. Bul. 408 April, 1954) Agric. Exp. Sta. Iowa State College.
  10. Kaplan, Marshall.On Estimating Demand Parameters With Special Reference to Food, AgriculturalEconomics Research Paper No. 5415. September 24, 1954.
  11. Lee, Ivan M., “Temperature Insurance — An Alternative to Frost Insurancein Citrus,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXV (February, 1953).
  12. Nordin, J. A., Judge, George G., and Wohby, Omar, Application of Econometric Procedures to Demands for Agricultural Products, Res. Bul 410 (July, 1954) Agri. Exp. Sta. Iowa State College.
  13. Tolley, George, “Minimizing Grain Storage Costs,” Journal of Farm Economics, XXXV (November, 1953).
  14. Foreign Agricultural Service. Agricultural Market and Price Policies in Foreign Countries. Report No. 74 (September, 1953).

Source: Harvard University Archives. Papers of Zvi Griliches, Box 130, Folder “Syllabus and exams, 1955-1959”.

Image Source:  T. W. Schultz, University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf1-07484, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library. Colorized by Economics in the Rear-view Mirror.