The federal government owns 640 million acres of land—mainly in the West—which is 28 percent of land in the United States. For more than a century after the nation’s founding, the federal government aimed to sell or give away western lands to individuals, businesses, and state governments. But by the turn of the 20th century, federal policy came under the sway of progressives, who favored increased federal control.
Progressives had a misguided notion that federal ownership would be efficient and environmentally sound. Broadly speaking, they were wrong. Experience has shown that federal agencies mismanage land from both economic and environmental perspectives, as discussed here and here. The solution is to devolve ownership of most federal land to the states and private sector.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) owns about 250 million acres of land, of which about 160 million acres are used for livestock grazing. Cato scholar Steve Hanke championed BLM land privatization as an economist for President Ronald Reagan. He proposed that ranchers be allowed to buy the grazing land that they currently rent from the BLM.
Privatization would create benefits by securing property rights. Currently, ranchers are uncertain about their future access to the federal grazing lands they use, so they have incentives to overstock the lands and disincentives to make capital improvements. Privatization would allow ranchers to plan for the best economic and environmental rangeland management over the long term.
Read more at https://www.cato.org/blog/privatizing-federal-grazing-lands
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