The study of operator entry in Iowa farming reported in this bulletin had two primary objectives: ( 1) to establish a benchmark for analyzing posting, the conditions under which they achieved entry and the financial results experienced during the initial year of operation. A series of follow-up studies of the same group is planned for future years.

Data for the current study were obtained by personal interview from a sample of farm operators who entered farming in 1959 and 1960. The sample of entrants was obtained from a state-wide sample survey involving nearly 7,000 farm operators. It was based on a self-weighting single-stage sample of area segments drawn at random from a universe defined as the open-country zone of Iowa by the current Master Sample materials.

Entrants were classified into two groups: beginning entrants and other entrants. The beginning-entrant group consisted of persons who had never farmed before the year of entry and persons who had farmed before the year of entry but had disposed of their farming assets with the apparent intent of permanent withdrawal. Other entrants consisted of persons who had farmed during an earlier period but had temporarily withdrawn from farming (retained their farming assets) with the apparent intent of re-entering.