Norwich bulletin., 1914-08-15
AVERAGE FARMS AND AVERAGE INCOMES

Written Specially for The Rulletin.) ! Aceording to the last census the farms of the whole United states aV- eraged 13S acres each.
 The average investment in each farm was S6,443, or about $46.69 per acre. This includes buildings and tools, etc, as well as land values.
 The average income, per farm, after deducting interest, wages, repairs, etc, is $537. This does not include the farm products which may be consum- ed on the farmers table. Nor does IL include any income derived from oth- CT sources, investments, mortgages, or the like. It is simply the value to the farmer of what his farm produces and he sells.
 Of course, all talk about leverage" farms or average" incomes has httle relation to individual farms-yours and mine. No farm is, itself, an ex- aa actly average" farm. The same with. trees and rocks. Mighty few trees are exactly yard high: mighty few rocks are exactly a cubic yard. Neverthe- Iess, the yardstick is a handy measure, and helps tis to estimate the height ofralI sorts of trees and the bulk of all sorts of rocks. A farm average" IS just a sort of yardstick by which we may compare our own and see now we stand in comparison with the oth- CT members of our big farmers army
 Take farm like my Neighbor Waite,s, with it's more than 1,20e acres its force of more than dozen workers, it's investment aggregat1ng s4O,0O0 or S50,000. One would be Justified in assuming that 1t would bring, in a larger met income than the fifteen acre farm of Neighbor Snyder. Yet I heAfd MT: Waite say, not long ago, that he didn't believe there was a, tanner in. town clearing $500 a year. This may be taken as pretty fair evil deaice that he isn't. on his big farm Att the same time I happen to know that Snyder is making mighty close to that figure off his fifteen acres.
 He doesn't have to pay anything like as much as Waite in interest and taxes and wages, nor for fences and repairs and fertilizers. Furthermore, as he can give every square foot of his little farm personal attention and better cultivation, he gets, acre for acre, a good deal better crops than Waite. His. gross income is probably not one-tenth that of the other man, but after both have paid interest and taxes and wages, etc, his net income probably comes to very near as much.
 This throws an interesting sideiight Dn the old and never-to- -be-s settled controversy between the big farm and the little farm. But I'm not thinking soI much about that this morning. There's a deal to be said O both sides, In that matter. What I'm thinking about is that $537 average income.
 And whether or no it justifies the frequently heard assertion that ~farmin' don't pay"
 The average farmer works 365 days year, and 366 on leap years. I don't
 l. ,4e- wood on Sundays But the average" .arm has a span of horses, and sev- sra1 cows, and pig or two, and a bunch of hens, etc, etc. The stables nave to be cleaned out once and the COWS milked twice, and the whole nenageries fed three times on Sun day, same as any other @ay. Just the chores around the average farm amount to what good many folks would consider a pretty fair days work. His wages, therefore, amount Q a fraction over $147 a day Out of hat he must clothe, shelter, pay gro- .:ery bills for an average" family of i've, educate three of them, and lay aside enough to care for at least two n their old age. With the exception Sf Sundays he works from ten to fif- :eenteen hours a day, the year round The average unmarried farmland whom he hires thinks he can't even i've and do ten hours work six days week, for less than $1.75 a day. He writes to the papers telling how farm abor is overworked and underpaid f he gets less than that or is asked te work longer hours.
 All of which certainly seems to give iharp point to the question whether .arming really pays the farmer.
 And I'm mot going to say one harsh word about the pessinist who, inspir- sd by such facts declares that ii ioesn't pay. and that the man is fool sh who sticks to it when he can dc something else.
 But