In other words, remember the level of analysis. And, more importantly, remember the saying, change what you can change, accept what you can not and hope that you are smart enough to know the difference. There are two basic questions that the farm business must answer continually. These sound simple enough but they are difficult questions and ones that are not frequently asked. This is the basic level that we will not be able to escape if we want to have a successful farm business.
Economists divide resources into four basic categories - land, labor, capital and management.
There are many variations around the same theme but, in general, this is the easiest way to think about the resources that the farm has to manipulate. Similar to most everything else the deeper you delve, the more murky things become. The question of resource availability is really one of acquiring the use of the resource. There are many examples of this distinction. This consideration isn t intended to confuse the issue but to illustrate impacts of one of the changes that have occurred and will continue to occur with more frequency in production agriculture.