The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-02-04
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
Information Bureau
FREDERIC j. HASKIN, Director.
Washington, D. @.
POLITICS AND FARMERS.

washington, II. L., req. 1.--WHy is
it that farming, the greatest business
in the United States and the most i'm
portant one in the world, does not pay
in this country and is never stable?
That is the question which is theo-
retica1ly before the national farm con-
ference, but there is no evidence what
ever that the conference will shed any
more light on the subject than the un-
employment conference did on the
fundamental causes of unemployment
or than the disarmament conference
did on the problem of world peace, or
than any other political conference
ever sheds on anything.
1t is an illuminating experience to
read the political announcements on
the subject of the farmer and farm
ing, and then study the views of any
competent student of the agrarian
problem and compare them. 1t gives
the innocent and unprejudiced investi-
gator the impression that politics is
largely the art of lodging the facts.
1t is true that there are more politi-
cal and legislative remedies before the
public for solving the farm problem
than there are patent medicines for
curing corns. The politicians propose
a tariff on farm products, they pro-
pose to encourage cooperative mar
keting, and they have a dozen other
projects for ameliorating the farmers
lot. Most of them have been tried be-
fore and none of them has made any
large or permanent difference. Con-
gress has been turning out large guam
titles of Legislation for farmers at
every session for generations, and yet
the condition of the farmer has got
steadily worse ever since about 1890.
It is not meant to imply that none
of the legislation passed and proposed
is of any valuei but simply to point
out the obvious fact that none of it has
worked any permanent change in the
general condition of the farmer. The
only thing, which can be said is that
ever since the body of free public land
in the United States was exhausted,
which happened about or soon after
1899, farming has been falling into a
more and more precarious condition.
The Price of Land.
1t is not unreasonable then to as
sumo some connection between the
disappearance of free land and the
present unstable and Improbable con-
dition of farming as a business. Ever
since the free land was exhausted, the
price of land has risen steadily in this
country and to astonishing heights. This
high price of land, we are assured by
all students of the problem, is the fun
damentaI reason why farming does not
pay, and they assure US that it cannot
pay until those land values are some
how brought down and stabilized. 1t
must be made possible for the man
who wants to farm to invest his money
in land and make a good return on the
investment. And it must be made
more profitable for the man who owns
land to stay on It and farm it than to
sell it and go to the city and invest
money in something else. These sim
pie facts are always and completely
overlooked by congress and by the
politicians generally. It would be a
safe bet that there will be no discus
sion of this phase of the matter at the
conference
Every competent man in the depart
ment of agriculture knows that in
flated and ever-rising land values are
the whole trouble WITHDRAWING, and
half a dozen OF them have explained
the matter to the writer of this article.
But don't quote me-" they always
end up. Their jobs are political jobs
The opinion that something must be
done about land values is by no means
confined to so-called radicals Col
leges and banks are not radical insti-
buttons. Yet the gist of the whole
matter is contained in some figures
compiled by the Iowa State College
of Agriculture and published in ore
of its market letters by the National
City bank of New York.
a Typical Case.
This study comprised, among other
things, an investigation of 100 farms
devoted to the raising of oats The
average value of the land was found
to be $3.50 per acre. The largest item
in the cost of production of oats on
this land was the interest on the mon |
ey invested in the land at 5 II per
cent This production cost came to
1888 per acre All other production |
costs came to $1509 per acre. Thus |
over half the cost of production was
interest on the investment in land. |
The study showed that on only two |
farms out of the 1876 were oats pro- |
duced for less than the market price |
of oats, which is A cents a bushel. In |
other words. all of the other farmers i
were raising oats at a loss. They |
could vastly better afford to sell their |
land and put the money and their |
time in something else.
This is the way the thing works. |
As population increases the price of |
land rises steadily, inevitably. The re-
suit is that the price of farm products !
also rises All of us, when we pay /
our grocery bins, are giving half the |
is constant opposition on the part of |
the consuner-to the rise of food prices. |
Hence the price of land tends to rise
always a little faster than the price |
of farm products. The land price is |
pressing always against the food price, |
so to speak, and the farmer is caught |
and squeezed between the two.
Everything that is done to make |
farming easier only contributes to
raise the price of land and force up
the price of food, so that neither the
farmer nor the consumer benefits. A !
protective tariff on farm products is
on Just this ground, and so
are all of the other political panaceas
that are offered the farmer.
1t would be impossible to outline
here the methods by which the prices
of farm land might be stabilized.
None of them is acceptable to the in
terests now in control of the country
and that is why the matter is never
discussed. Yet it seems certain that |
the country must ultimately face the |
facts and act upon them.
George Matthew Adams
no;I,, TIL I