The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1889-10-08

Manufacturing, like farming, suf'
fered depression during the decade
from 1870 to 1880, the latter, how,
ever, much greater than the former.
The reader will observe that during
the decade between 1850 and 1860,
under a low revenue tariff, agricul.
tural values increased over 100 per
cent, while manufactured values in
creased IS per cent. During the ten
years from 1870 to 1880 there was a
slight decrease in farm values, and at
the anne time an increase in value of
manufactured products of 26.08 per
cent. To be more explicit, agricul-
ture exceeded manufacturing in the
increased value of products from 1850
to 1860 about 10 per cent, while
from 1870 to 1880 manufacturing led
agriculture 26.97 per cent, a differ,
ence in twenty years in favor of the
manufacturing industry of AZ per
cent.
Since 1880 there has been a great
revival in the manufacturing and
mining industries all along the line,
probably the greatest in the history
of this government, while the farm.
ing industry has languished from
year to year, and the next census can
only reveal how poor a progress this
industry has made during the decade.
The relative value of farm to man.
ufactured products, according to the
capital invested in each, in 1880 is,
for the farm, $l2, O99, O8l,431, which
gave products, less cost of labor, ST.
1876, 766, 400; for manufactures, CAPT.
tai $2,79O,272, 6O6, which gave, less
the cost of wages and material, ST..
O24, SOl, S4l; yield from the farms,
l4.8 per cent; yield from the manu-.
features, 36.7 per cent.
1880. Wages Paid
Number of laborers en-
gagged in agriculture. 1898, 876 80, 826, 1856
Wages earned per year
Mum GER of laborers en-
plOyed in manufac-
turing 2,732, 595 947. 953 .79s
Wages earned per year
per head in mAnufac-
turing ............. ........ 348. OF
THEY CANNOT KEEP WHAT THEY MAKE.
Mr.. Ava E. Page makes the follow.
ing statement in The San: Between
the years 1860 and 1880, as the cen.
sus records show, the farmers added
81, l22, 588, All to their wealth, but
the other half of the population added
$23, 359, 791,85l to their wealth, a
gain Of S. to them to ST for the
farmers" How much of the twenty
three billions we're earned by the
farmers and flched from them to
swell the ill-gotten wealth of specu.
lators, extortioners, monopolists, cor.
porations and trusts, no one will ever
know.
There is no mistake about the fact
that the agriculturists of this country
add yearly many millions of dollars
to the wealth of the nation, as Stats.
tics incontestabg show, but they re.
tain and enjoy a very slim percentage
of their hard earnings. They labor
harder, more constantly and more
hours, and except a plenty of frugal
AOAAO 404O oAO 4OOuSG u0dlL1, enjoy
generally fewer of the luxuries, pleas,
ures, amenities and comforts Of life
than any other class of like capabili
ties and attachments. There has been,
at least since 1861, and is now, less
expended by the farmer on his table,
clothes for himself and family, car.
rlages, furniture, education of his
children and the pleasures of travel
and qualification of other social pleas.
ures than any other class possessing
the same culture or position in society
1t is all a mistake to suppose that the
farmer is using his income extrava
gantly, for the very reverse is true
Many, after hard, close labor and
most rigid economy, can scarcely
make buckle and tongue meet at the
end of the year.
WHAT THE FIGURES PROVE.
| Looking back over the statistics