The Ward County independent. [volume] (Minot, Ward County, N.D.) 1902-1965, 1918-07-25

farmers believe that their economic
salvation lay in raising more produce,
and the majority would raise bigger
crops the same year, farm produce
would, under peace conditions, become
a drug on the market and would go
begging for takers at almost any
price. The average farmer would
make less money than in years of
normal crops.
As long as we succeed in persuad
ing only a few farmers to improve
their methods of farming and raise
bigger crops, these few will benefit
by this appeal and will realize bigger
incomes than their neighbors. But
this is a business method that can not
be applied to all or a majority Of the
farmers. It defeats it's own purposes
by causing an overproduction Of farm
products. About 100000 farmers are
now supplying the people of the Unit
ed States from year to year with all
the farm produce they can buy and alb
sorb. This makes an average of
1868 worth of farm produce at pre-
sent prices to the farm. 1t is useless
to talk about increasing the farmers
income by raising bigger crops until
we have expanded this market until
it will absorb bigger crops.
The first problem of turning farm
ing into a business is improving the
market so it will absorb the maxi
mum amount of farm produce.
The Importance of the Home Market
A great deal has been said about
the value of foreign markets to farm
ers. Politicians have held this will
o'-the-wisp before farmers eyes for
more than generation and have in
volved farmers so much in fight
among themselves over tariff and free
trade issues, that they have lost the
true perspective of markets. The
foreign market question is not i'm
portant. Only per cent of the Am
erican farmers produce is exported;
96 per cent is consumed at home. The
big question with the farmer is ex-
panding the home market.
| We live under system where the
majority of the people are never able
to buy all they want of anything. I'm
der this kind Of system the market
means whatever the people are able
to buy. Our markets can be ex-
banded in almost any direction byl
increasing the average income of the
people. The majority of the people
of the United States are wage earn
ers. These wage earnerS live in the
towns and the cities. They constitute
the overwhelming majority of the in
habitants of these towns and cities.
The wage earners are the farmers
home market, and their condition is
more important to the farmers pros
perity than all our foreign markets.
Increase wages in the United States
20 per cent and you have expanded
the market for farm products far
more than all the foreign markets in
the world will ever amount to.
1t is good business for the farm
er to see in clear and broad light
that his interests are bound up econ
omically with the interests of the town
workers; that they are his market;
that one of the big farm problems
is getting farm products to these con-
sumers by as short route and as
cheaply as possible, so that the pro-
Queer and the consumer will realize
the money thus saved. 1t is good
politics for the farmer to cooperate
politically with the city wage Garner
to the end that both shall have their
share in the control Of government,
so that nonproducers may be eimin-
ated and market conditions improved
for both producers and consumers.
But improving the home market by
helping the people to become better
consumers is only the first step
toward real business farming. The
main problem is securing equitable
prices for what the farmer raises.
This involves the problem of con-
troll over marketing and price-tixing.
Must Control the Markets
We do not realize what big ques-
ton this is and what enormous prom
Uses it holds out until we begin to
compare farming with some other
industry that is actually on a bust
! ness basis. According to the 1910
census, the same year that 6,631 ,5O2
farmers and their help on a capital
ization Of $4,000 ,449,O9O were pro-
ducing an output they sold for S5,487,-
100000, 7,678,578 owners and work.
ers in the manufacturing industry en-
ploying $18,428, 270,000 worth of cap
ital, turned out product, they sold
for $2O,672,0 52,O0O.
The farmers with their hired help
outnumbered the manufacturing peo-
pie. Farm investments totaled more
than twice as much as manufacturing
investments. The products from the
farms were worth more to the nation
than the products from the factories.
Yet the manufacturers managed to
sell their output for more than four
times as much as the farmers sold
theirs.
There are three main reasons why
the manufacturers received so much
more for product that was really
worth less to the nation: The manu-
facturers were organized; they main
tain a considerable control over the
marketing of their own products;