Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1907-04-20
PROBLEM OF HIRED HELP.
Brains Worth as Much on the Farm
as in the City.

There may be one commodity that
is more scarce than good hired help in
the sphere of farm operations, but it
would be hard to say just what that
commodity is. There are plenty OF
men looking for work on the farm but
the mere fact that they are looking
for work is suspicious, because their
could suitably fill such positions.
Thousands of farmers are now asking |
themselves what they can do in the
face of the hired help problem. Some
will be compelled to change their farm
operations, some will have to sell out
and the balance will absorb the really
efficient help.
What are we going to do about it?
In the first place, it will become neces-
sary for us to look at the matter in a
slightly different way than from our
view point at present We are no
longer in the pioneer stage when we
can expect to hire good men at from
$40 to $25 a month. Nowadays a
good man can command $50 month
most any place and after all it doesn't
really matter much what we have to
pay the good man. A good hired man
who understands farming and who, by
! watching all the little details about
stock and general farm work and thus
saving money in hundred different
ways is worth $40 a month if the poor
man is worth 1875. In the business
world salaries are on the rapid in
crease and the business man regulates
the wages of his employees by what
they individually are worth to him
or his rival not by the standard of
wages paid to like EMPLOYEES. The
business man considers an employee
who is specialist in his line as in
valuable to his business and the salary
becomes minor item. Farmers are
being compelled to look at the matter
in the same light as does the business
man and they will find that hiring a
man is not mere matter of contract
ing for so much brute strength and
aWkWardness. Brains on the farm are
worth almost as much as brains in the
city. In order to pay higher wages we
must perfect our farm organization
and make it more like a business en-
terprise. We must study better farm
ing, we must study the adaptability of
the farm factory Or the soil and the
keeping of it at high producing pitch.
We must study the science of selling
manufactured product in the shape of
fat stock and dairy products instead of
the crude material in the form of
grain, thus eliminating the middle
mans profit. We must study the value,
lof by products, such as manure. We
must keep a system of books so that
we will know where we are at all the
time. By following these plans for
progressive farming the question of
wages will solve itself for at the same
time we are planning the farming we
are learning how much we can afford
to pay hired help and hired brains.
A business man who owns farm
recently asked us where ne could get
good farm foreman. He was dis
gusted with the man in his present
employ, he neglected the little things
about the farm. He wanted man who
understood scientific farming, who un-
derstood live stock, who understood
keeping books, who understood hand
ling men and the hundred other little
essentials which a first-class farm
foreman ought to know. For all this
knowledge the man expected topaz his
foreman from $50 to $40 a month. We
answered his question by asking how
much he thought foreman with ex-
ecutive ability to run his farm would
be worth in some business occupation
in the city and he had to confess that
man who could successfully compete
with the many annoyances on the
farm and carry the managing work
through successfully would be worth
from $500 to $4,000 year in the city
; in position that called for the same
amount of brains. The man expected
to buy brains at the price of manual
labor. We told him that we didn t know
where he could find man. And there
. you have the situation which is puz-
cling many farm owner of today
|, The Farmer.
Flax Tow Mills for Sale.
Mr.. V. r. Blehdon of Buffalo, n. Y.