Comment by pembrook

What? Yes, you absolutely can buy half an acre. You think in 1880 people went on Zillow to buy land?

You're just going to have to do this the 1880 way.

Knock on the door of a land owner and offer to buy/rent half an acre so you can farm. You'll find takers. My extended family literally has this arrangement with many people who farm different crops during different seasons.

Too hard to to do it that way? Welcome to 1880! Most people weren't land owners on the land they farmed back then and didn't have 'Perfectly arable' plots, and this was pre-fertilizer.

Oh and you'll have to use horse and buggy to get around to find land owners (no evil automobiles from those evil factories full of automation!) who will allow you to farm their land, just like 1880. So good luck.

I don't know how many times I need to explain this to tech doomers: nobody forced people out of subsistence farming. They chose to leave it. It was not a utopia.