Declining Liquidity in Iowa Farms: 2014–2017

The goal of the present study is to describe the evolution of financial liquidity in Iowa farms for 2014–2017, using a unique panel of 220 mid-scale commercial farms. Farms with vulnerable liquidity ratings increased from 33.2 percent in December 2014 to 45.0 percent in December 2017. On average, farms lost $244 of working capital per acre over that period, but farms with vulnerable liquidity ratings in December 2017 lost almost 60 percent more than that, or $388. Average farm size, machinery investment per acre, farm net worth per acre, debt-to-asset ratio, and age of operator were not significantly different across liquidity-rating categories