Land Reform and Productivity: A Quantitative Analysis with Micro Data
通过定量模型和微观数据，评估了1988年菲律宾土地改革对农场规模和农业生产率的影响，发现改革使平均农场规模下降34%，生产率下降17%，且政府分配土地和禁止土地转让是导致负面效果的关键因素。
We assess the effects of a major land policy change on farm size and agricultural productivity using a quantitative model and micro-level data. We study the 1988 land reform in the Philippines that imposed a ceiling on land holdings, redistributed above-ceiling lands to landless and smallholder households, and severely restricted the transferability of the redistributed farmlands. We study this reform in the context of an industry model of agriculture with a nondegenerate distribution of farm sizes featuring an occupation decision and a technology choice of farm operators. In this model, the land reform can reduce agricultural productivity not only by misallocating resources across farmers but also by distorting farmers’ occupation and technology decisions. The model, calibrated to prereform farm-level data in the Philippines, implies that on impact, the land reform reduces average farm size by 34 percent and agricultural productivity by 17 percent. The government assignment of land and the ban on its transfer are key for the magnitude of the results since a market allocation of the above-ceiling land produces about one-third of the size and productivity effects. These results emphasize the potential role of land market efficiency for misallocation and productivity in the agricultural sector.