Ken White describes a few of the technological contributions that research at Utah State University has made to agriculture.

Marie Christensen discusses how farm machinery has changed over the years. 

Cliff Lillywhite talks about how technology has changed the process of egg farming from modernizations in the chicken feed supply chain to preparing the eggs for sale.

Discoveries made during World War II led to rapid agricultural technological advancement in the years following the war. These advancements continued over the 20th century as the United States government began funding more research and development designed to increase crop yields while lowering costs (1).

These significant technological advances have allowed farms to become more productive and more efficient, but they are very expensive. According to the KSL classifieds page, a used Ag-Industrial tractor sells from $38,000 to $250,000 in Utah today. Additionally, costs continue to increase over time. A new tractor cost $81,343* in 1965 while a nearly identical tractor cost $154,235 in 2008 (2). 

If you consider the increasing costs of farm technology compared to the decreasing prices of markets, these machines require a farm to sell thousands of bushels in order to break even, a phenomenon knows as "cost-price squeeze." As a result, many family farms are unable to afford updated machinery and have a difficult time competing with industrial farms. 

*All figures adjusted for inflation