Patterns of state productivity growth in the US farm sector: Linking stateand aggregate models

This article focuses on agricultural productivity growth at both sector and state levels. It does so in a way that preserves the economic integrity of national and state production accounts. A model accounting for interstate transactions in farm goods links sectorwide and state-specific measures of total factor productivity growth. An interesting conclusion is that the smo oth, persistently positive trend typically observed for farm sector product ivity growth masks considerable variation across states and regions. The re sults also indicate that farm sector productivity growth is wholly a functi on of productivity trends in the individual states. Interstate shifts in pr oduction activity and resource reallocations have had little impact.