 Contrary to the predictions made by the detractors of the government , the law resulted in a slight increase in Guatemalan agricultural productivity , and to an increase in cultivated area . Purchases of farm machinery also increased . Overall , the law resulted in a significant improvement in living standards for many thousands of peasant families , the majority of whom were indigenous people . Historian Piero Gleijeses stated that the injustices corrected by the law were far greater than the injustice of the relatively few arbitrary land seizures . Historian Greg Grandin stated that the law was flawed in many respects ; among other things , it was too cautious and deferential to the planters , and it created communal divisions among peasants . Nonetheless , it represented a fundamental power shift in favor of those that had been marginalized before then . 
