@Lyle Some US states do have very simple policies that incentivize landowners to pay farmers. (E.g., if you own land and claim it's a farm to get a property tax break, the land gets audited sometimes to make sure it's actually being farmed. That makes it more expensive to hold land idle & incentivizes paying someone to manage it.)

That said, tax policies alone can't lead to change. Good luck getting them passed if landowners don't know how to deal with them, etc. Hence threads like this.