Tools
The estimator asks what a product pays at a yield and price you pick. This one asks a harder question: if SCO, ECO and MCO had all existed over the last eight crop years, built exactly as they are for 2027, and you had bought them — what would they have paid on your acres?
It is a what-if on purpose. ECO has only been offered since 2021 and MCO since 2026, and the 90% SCO trigger and single 95/90 bands are 2027 creations. Putting today's structure over older county results is the only way to compare the three on equal footing — the county yields, prices and margins underneath are RMA's own published figures.
Endorsement history
Set your coverage and your acres. Every year is scored as though all three endorsements had been on offer that year on the 2027 terms below, and you had bought them — the county figures underneath are RMA's real published ones.
Swipe the chart sideways for the rest of the years.
Everything turns on two numbers. SCO and ECO trigger on county revenue against its expected level; MCO triggers on county margin — that same revenue less RMA's published operating cost. The shaded band is the slice your ECO or MCO covers; the lower line is where SCO stops. A year only pays when its dot drops into a band.
Swipe the chart sideways for the rest of the years.
Every figure behind the charts. Ratios are the county's final result as a share of its expected level; the payment factor is how far into the band that fell, capped at 1.
| Year | Rev ratio | Marg ratio | SCO factor | ECO factor | MCO factor | SCO | ECO | MCO |
|---|
Swipe the table sideways for the payment columns.
ECO and MCO are one or the other. They occupy the identical band, so you cannot carry both on the same crop in the same year. Both columns are shown so you can compare them — never add them together.
What this is built on. RMA's published county figures: expected and final county yield, the margin projected price, the spring projected price, the harvest price, and RMA's own expected and final county margins. Those are real. Where RMA published no margin for a county-year, that year shows MCO as unavailable rather than guessing.
What is hypothetical. The endorsements themselves. SCO has been offered since the 2015 crop year, ECO only since 2021, MCO only since 2026 — and the 90% SCO trigger and single 95/90 ECO and MCO bands are 2027 creations that existed in none of these years. Applying today's structure to older county results is the only way to compare the three products fairly, but it does mean nobody actually collected these amounts.
What it is not. Eight years is eight years, not a probability. A county that would have paid three times since 2018 is not a county that pays three years in ten. Past county results also say nothing about your own farm's yields in those years — these endorsements settle on the county, which is exactly why they can pay when you had a fine crop, and fail to pay when you did not.
Premium is not included. These are gross indemnities, before your share of the cost. Figures are estimates for planning discussion, not a quote.
It is the honest one we have — RMA has published county margins only since 2018 — but eight observations is not a probability, and a county that would have paid three times is not a county that pays three years in ten. Read it as a comparison, not as odds, and certainly not as a track record: nobody collected these amounts, because two of the three products did not exist for most of these years.
What it is good for is the comparison: whether ECO or MCO would have served your ground better, and by how much. That is a real decision, and it is the one worth talking through.