AN ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF SELECTED U.S. DAIRY PROGRAM CHANGES

An interregional reactive programming model of the United States dairy industry is used to test the welfare implications of several dairy program changes on milk producers, milk consumers, and taxpayers. The results showed that each of the tested alternatives (price support reduction, price support reduction with frozen minimum Class I price, assessments, and production quotas) could reduce price support expenditures substantially. However, assessments reduced expenditures most effectively in terms of cost to milk producers for the United States generally while the price support reduction with frozen minimum Class I price was most efficacious in terms of cost to Southeast producers