This book contains a series of essays based on public lectures delivered by six agricultural economists during the 1986-1987 academic year at Western Michigan University. Some of the main issues and problems addressed in the essays are the role of technical change in agricultural development, the value of learning from historical and comparative…

The 1980s found the U.S. economy vulnerable in the global marketplace. Many observers have argued that workforce education and skill levels are too low, particularly in rural areas. In this book, four studies examine the education crisis, the relationship between the education shortfall and rural economic stagnation, the importance of local…

In late 1980 several regional and national meetings were convened to develop a set of proposed national goals for linking education and economic development in rural America in the 1980s; the 9 commissioned papers in this report provide background information for the overall project and an appendix contains the resulting 10 proposed national…