Omaha daily bee., 1917-06-04
Controlling the Nations Food-lV
Prices and Price FIXING
By Frederic j. Has in

Washington, June 1.-There is one thing which
every consumer can do right now to keep prices
down, and that is to refrain from buying more
than he usually buys Of staple food articles The
present high prices of staples is due in no small
part to the sudden alarm about food shortage,
which has sent housekeepers in to the market
to buy far beyond their immediate needs. For
example, in a certain suburb the people have
dubbed together to buy -four by the barrel. A
certain clerk makes it practice to buy ten pounds
OF sugar every day. All over the country these
things are being done. One of the results is that
miers have orders for about twice what their
mills can produce. The inevitable effect is to
force prices upward, to encourage speculation.
Food boarding is not economy To buy vege-
lar to preserve fruits and put them on the pantry
shelf are genuine food economies because in these
ways you may save foods which are abundant in
the summer, and large quantities OF which will
rot. By such expedients as these you are adding
your mite to the nations food supply. But by
boarding -four and sugar you are forcing up the
price of these articles, and you are not increasing
the supply.
Price-hxing will not be resorted to at all until
the need for it is certain. The first price fixed, If
any price is fixed, will be minimum price for
certain staples This price will be high enough
to assure the farmer Of liberal profit over all
costs of production. If then, staple becomes SO
abundant that its market value is less than the
price which the government had guaranteed to the
producer, the government will make up the diff
ference. This is the working of the minimum
price, as it was explained to the house committee
on agriculture .-
Such a minimum price would tend to insure
the farmer, not only against loss, but against the
possibility of not making good profit. 1t was
pointed out to the committee, however, that prices
OF farm machinery and tools, fertilizer and other
costs of production might advance so that even
the guaranteed price would not mean profit, In
asmuch as the protection Of the farmer is the
main consideration OF all this price-hxing legisla-
ton, and the minimum price is to allow good
profit all costs of production, this is not prob
able. The provision in the bill which allows for
the fixing of maximum price was drawn, how
ever, with this contingency largely in mind 1t
would make it possible to FIX the price OF farm
machinery so that the farmer could not lose his
profit in increased costs.
In the long and earnest discussion which pre-
ceded the drawing of the price-hxing clauses in
the bill now before congress, the ultimate con-
sumer was seldom mentioned. However, it may
be applied, the theory of the bill. as understood
by the congressman, was to fix prices solely with
view to the farmers welfare. 1t is assumed that
there will then be greatly increased production,
and that this abundance together with the elimin-
alton of speculation, the careful supervision OF
shipments and of storage will automatically take
care of prices.
For example, many farmers this year sold their
potatoes for dollar bushel or less and after
ward saw those same potatoes sold in the market
for three to four dollars bushel. 1t is evident
that carriers and middlemen made an exorbitant
profit at the expense of both producer and con-
sumer. Under the food administration as planned,
supposing that a minimum price had been fixed,
the farmer would have gotten perhaps two dol
lars for his potatoes, and with careful government
supervision of shipment and storage, they would
have reached the consumer at just enough more
than that to pay the legitimate costs of distribut
ing them. An arbitrary maximum price upon po-
tatoes, it may be safely said, will be one of the
last expedients resorted to by the food admins
traitor. .t.t '...
Needless to say, these price-fxing provisions
of the bill will be fought in congress and may
be stricken out. Even the committee deviated
somewhat from scientific lines in drawing them.
The consensus of expert opinion seems to be that
a fixed price or basic price Is the best. A mimi
mum price to the producer nsures him but does
not prevent speculation. A maximum price is hard
to enforce, because if the farmer does not want
to sell his corn for example, at the maximum
price, or if the market price drops below the maxi
mum price, he may feed his corn to his hogs and
sell them. A fixed price, guaranteed by the gov
ernment, which will assure the producer OF good
profit over all costs of production, is considered
to be the most scientific method of prce-hxing
This sort of price was urged upon the house
agricultural committee but the congressman
would not accept it, apparently because they were
afraid their farmer constituents would resent hav-
ing limit thus arbitrarily set to the amount they
might earn.
It might be added that, according to DR.. A. E.
| Taylor, who spent some months in Europe study
| ing food administration, the European countries
have not been able to keep the price of food down
to the rate of wages. All over the world the cost
| of living has been advancing more rapidly than
| the rate of wages. War has brought this fact
home to the European governments, for in order
| to keep their industrial classes at work making
munitions they have had to pension them. Ac-
| cordng to DR.. Taylor the German government
has civil pension list Of between seven and eight
million people, who are paid pensions for the
| stated purpose OF making up the difference be-
| tween wages and the cost of living. Similar civil
pensions, he says, paid in the neutral countries
! of Holland and Switzerland for the same reason
| War; by making every man necessary to his gov
| ernment has forced the governments TO take heed
| OF what is necessary to every man.