River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1896-10-22

justed to the radical changes In value.
No farmer needs to be told that in times
of panic he cannot get good prices for
what he has to sell. Business panics
simply ruin the market, and he, being
forced to sell his crops as they are
raised, must sell for what he can get
at the time.
Now let us suppose we have reached
that period where business affairs are
becoming adjusted to debased cur
Tency. The man who eats what the
farmer grows, is the man who works for
wages. All contracts for wages are now
on the basis of dollars equal in purchas-
ing power to the present gold dollar.
When the panic is over, and prices of all
commodities begin to rise to level
corresponding to the decline in value of
the dollar, what will be the position
of the wage-worker? His condition will
measure the amount of prosperity that
the farmer is TO get, because it is his
purchases that will make the farmers
market. 1t is a law absolute and I'M
ehangeable, that the wages are the last
thing to rise. His employees will grant
him an increase of wages slowly, and
only when forced to do so. There will
be a struggle for years and years be-
tween employers and employees, ana
wages will go up but slowly. This
means then that the purchasing power
of his wages will for years be less than
now; consequently, he will be forced to
l,uy less than at present. This being so,
there will be less market for wheat, and
meats and farm products generally, I'M
less the farmer will sell more to him
for the same amount of money. In
stead, therefore, of getting better prices
for what he has to sell, the farmer
will find his market restricted, because
the workingman's wages are changed
bu: little and that slowly, and the prices
of his products viii be exactly in pro-
portion to the purchasing power of the
wages of the workingman.
Instead, therefore, of getting twice
as much for his wheat and hogs, he
will at first get the same as now, and
any further advance will be just as
slow as the advance in wages. AT the
same time, however, when he wants to
buy cloth or machinery or any other
manufactured product, he will find the
prices marked up promptly. The
manufactures may be slow in marking
up wages, but he will be prompt in
marking up the prices of what he has
to sell. The farmer will then find
that, while he now gets so cents in gold
for his bushel of wheat, he will then get
so cents on the silver standard, but,
when he wants to trade that so cents a.
the store, it will only go one-half as far
as his present so cents goes.
In the end, after years of ceaseless
struggle, conditions may become so
adjusted that the ratio between wages
and general prices will again become
equitable; but long before that will be
a fact thousands and thousands of
farmers will have been forced 10 give
up the struggle, their farms will have
been lost. and their children will won
der at the shortsightedness of their
fathers in supporting a policy which
finally wrought their ruin.
The kernel for farmers to grasp is
the fact that prices for their products
depend upon the wages paid the wage
earning class. When free silver cuts
tnCSe wages uoWn W puFCu3>iuS power
II cuts down The market. and therefore
I've price for farm products. While
DEPRECATED currency means higher
prices for what the farmer has 10 buy.
Il means low wages. and therefore low
prices for what he has TO sell. The
fate of the farmer and the fate of the
wage Garner are locked up together.
rtArs, ono fe S4r,,ck the 0fhar feels the
hlow.- Farmers Union and Agricul-
tural Review.
EyMr. Bryan says that gold is no bet
ter than silver. Isn't it2 Why then do
YOU advocate sixteen TO one instead of
one to one2 Is Mt that ar, admission
that gold is worth is times as much as
silver Iowa State Register.