Final answer:
The American food and agriculture industry, if considered as its own economy, has a significant GDP that would rank highly on a global scale due to the large size of the U.S. economy and advancements in agricultural technology. This sector’s productivity continues to increase despite the decreasing number of individuals employed in farming.
Step-by-step explanation:
The question refers to the hypothetical scenario wherein the American food and agriculture industry is considered as a separate economy, questioning its global economic rank based on its Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Though agriculture is a subset of the whole economy, it is crucial to understand its significance within the context of the national GDP and how it compares to other global economies.
The United States has the largest GDP in the world, and when considering the agricultural sector as an independent entity, it is inferred that this sector alone would have a substantial economic presence on a global scale. When we calculate GDP per capita—which is the GDP divided by the population—we discover the per-person economic output, allowing for comparisons across countries irrespective of population size.
Historically, the U.S. agricultural sector has evolved significantly. It has gone from being a labor-intensive industry to one which is increasingly technology-driven, leading to large boosts in productivity. Mechanization and high-tech agricultural advancements have allowed fewer people to produce more output. However, today's U.S. farmers and ranchers, who are less than 2% of the population, face economic challenges such as limited market competition and reduced control over the prices of their goods, implicating that consumer dollars do not translate directly into farm income as one might expect.