ESTIMATION OF SOCIAL WELFARE WEIGHTS IN AGRICULTURAL POLICY: THE CASE OF GREEK COTTON

This paper provides a welfare analysis of the Greek cotton market and obtains an estimate of the distributional weights implicit in the postulated welfare function of agricultural policy makers. The estimate of that weight depends, as might be expected, on the elasticity of supply and the difference between the support price and the market price. For the period covered, the welfare of Greek cotton producers was weighted about ten per cent more than that of taxpayers.