Socioeconomic Impacts and Social Implications of Reducing Pesticide and Agricultural Chemical Use in the United States

Abstract

The struggle over agricultural pesticides, which will soon enter its fourth decade, has long involved conflicting interests, opposing ideologies, and contradictory technical and social science data. This paper will focus on one dimension of these conflicts: debate over the prospective socioeco- nomic impacts of substantial reductions in the use of pesticides and other agricultural chemicals. Research on this topic is obviously central to pes- ticide politics and policy, since both sides of the struggle ultimately base their positions on claims that chemicals are or are not integral to the social and economic well-being of agriculturalists and of society as a whole.