Development of the American Economy.

• Position: Program and Working Group Meetings

The NBER's Program on the Development of the American Economy met in Cambridge on March 3. Program Director Claudia Goldin of Harvard University organized the meeting. These papers were discussed:

Richard C. Sutch, University of California, Riverside, and NBER, "Henry Agard Wallace, the Iowa Corn Tests, and the Adoption of Hybrid Corn: American Corn Yields, 1866-2002"

Martha J. Bailey, University of Michigan and NBER, "Momma's Got the Pill"

Richard H. Steckel, Ohio State University and NBER, and John J. Wallis, University of Maryland and NBER, "Stones, Bones, and States: A New Approach to the Neolithic Revolution"

Howard Bodenhorn, Lafayette College and NBER, "Partnership, Entity Shielding, and Credit Availability"

William O. Brown, Jr., University of North Carolina, Greensboro; J. Harold Mulherin, University of Georgia; and Marc D. Weidenmier, Claremont McKenna College and NBER, "Competing with the NYSE"

Frank Levy, MIT, and Peter Temin, MIT and NBER, "Inequality and Institutions in Twentieth Century America"

Sutch, in his paper, makes the following claims: First, there was not an unambiguous yield advantage of hybrid corn over the open-pollinated varieties in 1935. Rather, the early adoption of hybrid corn can better be explained by a sustained propaganda campaign conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture at the direction of the Secretary of Agriculture, Henry Agard Wallace. The Department's campaign echoed that of the commercial seed companies. The early adopters of hybrid seed were followed by later adopters because of the droughts of 1934 and 1936. The eventual improvement of yields, as newer varieties were introduced, explains the continuation and acceleration of the process. "[he biological revolution in corn was not a unique phenomenon. Sutch finds remarkably similar "hockey stick graphs" for the yields per acre in cotton, wheat, tobacco, oats, potatoes, and barley. The synthesis of ammonia and the resulting increase in the use of commercial fertilizers are the more likely sources of the increase in yields of so many other crops during this period.

The 1960s ushered in a new era in U.S. demographic history, characterized by rising ages at first marriage and first birth and sharp reductions in family size. The importance of the birth control pill in this transition, released for the regulation of menses in 1957 and approved for use as a contraceptive in 1960, has found little support in the empirical literature. Bailey develops...