Cow-calf production lifestyle choice

The cow-calf stage in raising beef cattle is part of the U.S. agricultural landscape, with a wide variation in farm revenue and production practices across the United States. Unlike other sectors in which farms are becoming larger, a relatively large percentage of beef cow-calf enterprises are still small-scale.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Agricultural Statistics Service’s latest Census of Agriculture, more than 622,000 of the 1.9 million U.S. farms -- about 33 percent -- had at least one beef cow at the end of 2022. Of those farms, about 55 percent had fewer than 20 beef cows.

The USDA Economic Research Service researchers suggested in 2011 that beef-cow-calf farming was likely a “lifestyle choice” for many farms, based on factors including farm size and owner characteristics. A more-recent Economic Research Service study showed cow-calf farming continues to be attractive to many farmers for whom lifestyle is likely a primary motivator of farm decision-making.

Currently beef cow-calf operations vary by size, occupation of the primary operator and income. Using those distinctions, researchers identified three categories of farms for the study -- rural residence, intermediate and commercial.

• Rural-residence farms include two types of small family farms earning less than $350,000 per year from farming. The first is where the principal operator -- the operator most responsible for day-to-day decisions on the farm -- reports being retired but still makes some money farming. For the second, the operator’s primary occupation is off-farm, and farming activities bring in less than $350,000 a year. Operators of rural-residence farms often enter farming for a range of lifestyle motivations sometimes associated with cow-calf production.
• Intermediate farms are where the principal operator’s primary occupation is farming, and the farm earns annual income of less than $350,000.
• Commercial farms comprise the remainder, earning at least $350,000 per year in annual gross cash income.

In 2018 about 39 percent of beef-cow-calf farms were rural-residence farms. Rural-residence farms held 23 percent of the total U.S. beef-cow inventory that year. On those farms 87 percent of total farm-production value was from cattle.

Seventy-three percent were cow-calf only, which means they sold their calves shortly after weaning instead of keeping them for subsequent phases of cattle production. Those farms rely on off-farm income -- such as retirement income, or wage and salary jobs -- to cover household and farm expenses.