Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-04-05
HIGHER PRICES FOR
FARMERS PRODUCTS
SEEN AS NECESSITY
BY HARDIN CoLEAx.
Ueased Wire Service to The Journal.)
.,rbA


WASHINGTON, April Food
prices must rise again-and rise
soon-~oefore the coming of real pros
perity. All the farmer raises is sold
for too little; he is receiving SO to
60-cent dollars for what he sells and
paying 100-cent dollars for what he
buys. The pendulum of price read
justment has swung too violently and
too far in his direction.
One or two things must happen,
Secretary of Agriculture Wallace be-
lieves, before the country can be
truly prosperous. And he sees the
dilemma, the horns are described
thus:
L. Farm products (and this means
all foodstugs) must rise approx
mately 20 per cent in wholesale
prices to the farmers; or
2. The retail price of everything
else must drop still further until the
buyers dollar and the farmers dol
lar are worth exactly the same
amount.
Present prospects are that both
movements will be noticeable within
q short time. Increased prices Of
foodstuffs will be brought about, to
some extent, it is believed, 10y the en-
actment of a tariff sufficiently hign
to prevent the dumping into Anerl-
can markets of farm products raised
abroad, these products at present be-
ing sold at prices lower than the cost
of producing the commodities on
American farms. Further price re-
auctions in everything. except farm
products, it is hoped. will result from
the working of the economic law
whose operation already has resulted
in the farmers present plight.
There are about 100000 farmers
in the United States and about d.
100000 persons engaged in agricul-
far and away the largest single in
dustry in the country. Farming is
basic industry, Secretary Wallace
points out, and unless the farmer IS
prosperous nobody else in the coun-
try can be.
At the present time the farmer is
selling almost everything he raises
at less than cost. ,a
Income Cut in Ka1r
The price he gets Tor MS products
is back, on average, to the Ere-War
standard The price he pays for
ages more than 80 per cant higher
than the pre-war standard. Thus, in
relative values, the farmers income
has been cut almost in halt. He can
not go into the store and spend 50
per cent more than he spent before
the war-aS he would have to do in
order to keep step with the rest of
the country-because he Isn't get
ting it.
So long as the farmer can't keep
step with the rest of the country in
purchasing power, the country will
continue to be beset with Industrial
and commercial ailments, Alr. Wal
lace believes. The farmer supports
the Eastern markets where the great
industries of the country center, and
one reason why those markets are
not now f1ourishing, according TO MIR.
Wallace's diagnosis, is be cause the
farmer can't support thom on MS
present income.
farm products which must come to
make the farmer, and consequently
the rest of the country, prosperous,
will be accompanied undoubtedly Dy
a rise in the retail prices OF goods.
AS retail prices have not declined TO
the same extent as wholesale, the
rise in retail prices have not declined
to the same extent as wholesale, the
rise in retail urices need not be SO
great, in percentage, rs the rise in
Unless there is rise in food
prices, 1--WE are smothered in our own
sweetness" Secretary Wallace fears.
Denied relief, the farmer he be-
lieves, will gradually sink TO the
level Of the peon' aiid the moujik. He
will drag the country with hinl-in-
dustries, transportation, finance and
all the other component parts OF our
complex commercial life-to just the
extent that he himself is curta1ied IN
his living standards.
The cost of living, Secretary Wal
lace estimates, at the present tlmc
is about $50 per cent OF the pre-Waf
cost Here is what the farmer Is
by the pre-war standard:
Farm Prices
For his cattle, the farmer is get
ting IL per cent of pre-War prices;
for his hogs, from liz to 147 per
per cent; corn, 81 per cent; oats, 70
per cent; wheat, delivered at Chica-
go, and including the much higher
freight rates, 14S to 155 per cent,
butter, 112 per cent; cotton, IS per
cent.
For his labor, the farmer is pay
ing, say. in Iowa, an average of $6S
a month and board as compared with
$40 and board in 1914-200 per cent
of pre,war prices; the e., pri1c ;fse OF
are up to from 100 to 220 per cent of
pre-war standards.
This situation cannot continue and
with it bring prosperity for the rest
of the country. The first thing that
must be done, if it can DC done, Sec
rotary Wallace believes, IS to make
the farmer prosperous. And appar-
entity the only way to make him pros
porous is to pay him more Tor what
he has to sell.
Following the reasoning one step
further, that process means addition
al millions--may be billions-in the