Norwich bulletin., 1922-09-22
CoUCING THE FARMER; SOAKING THE.
 CONSUMER
CUNoUMEk

city consumer is being soaked with utter ly disproportionate and unfair charges for the same goods, Only very few farmers living as one might say in city back-yards, can peddie their fruits or other products direct eo Sonsurners< The fruit grower with hundred acre peach orchard a hundred miles from city mar kete, can't take his fruit, a few baskets at time, to that city and sell them from door to door Even with the speediest of speed wagons. 1t would take him all the time just to go and come. And he must
 have some little time to pick and basket the fruit. Also, he must be around the barns at least twice day to milk the COWS and feed the pigs. He can't hire anybody to milk cows or feed pigs or pick fruit, these times, for all the cows and the pigs and the fruit wifi bring in. And so he has to sell in quantity and at the orchard or not at all.
 Nor can the average city censunex af. [ ford to take day off and drive hun l dred miles arld back to pick up a couple of 1 baskets of cheap peaches. That takes too many sfiillings for the pork.
 | But that city consumer could combine with ninety-nine other neighboring con
 sumers to send special truck that hun dred miles, buy up two hundred baskets, | anu them dL mere cost or peacileS 1 gasoline and one mans day's wages They could, if they chose, go over the heads of both gouging railroads and l profteering dealers. How much they ] might save would depend on circum-
 stances. Partly on outside conditions and l partly or. the amount of gumption they | possessed and the degree of cooperation | they were disposed to give each other.
 Of course. such a proceeding would take some trouble It would cause some to all the sharers in it's benefits, and a good deal to the two or three leaders who | would have to make the arrangements That brings the whole matter to its head. Are city consumers really ready to meet
 farm producers half way in inaugurating i a direct farm-to-ktchen trade? Are they
 disposed to take the necessary trouble | and do the necessary work?
 | Thus far small signs of such readiness are apparent The farmer keeps the air of his fields and orchards blue with de- nunciations of the speculative buyers who
 won't offer him quarter value for his crops. and the city consumer turns black
 in the face over the extortions of dealers
 who charge him double price for the same crops.
 For all of which neither one Is to be blamed too severely. It's hard to be hurt
 without yelling. That's human nature.
 But why not take some pains and give a
 little thought to avoiding the hurt? In comparatively small cities. where the farms lie right against the city limits
 the situation isn't so bad as in large cities with far flung fringes of parked and
 lawn-clipped suburbs. Likewise. on farms within easy reach of city markets the conditions are not so serious S on those
 at great distance and beyond the pogs:- bility of personal delivery But it's bad enough, anywhere and everywhere.
 can't for the life Of me sas why labo-
 unions. with their close organization anc
 machinery for concerted action, don
 more widely follow the example of thcs,
 In Toledo and Chicago and some othe, western cities and use their facilities fo saving money to their members by buyin, for them in wholesale quantities The, ' assume to act for the welfare of the vag r earners composing them Any reduction
 effected in the cost of foods would cer = tainly make for such welfare Isn't dollar saved just as big as a dollar earn
 ed? Really, wouldn't it be wiser to con
 ! serve wages by constructive economic h than to attempt to increase them by de v structive strikes?
 s There's nothing new in the fruit wastin U reports of this present fall. The sam e thing happened last fall and has bee O going on for years in greater or less de
 gree. It will continue next year and tn IT year after and so on till the consumer IS get ready to take the bits in their teet It and defy their would-be delivers, th r. profteers.
 'r Bawling and boo-hooing won't get | D. anywhere, though we below as loudly 2 n all the bulls of Bashan.
 le In the former days when apples wei E worth saving, the old farmer found tn: eS tossing twiss and sods at the boys in h
 Pipptn tree didn't bring them down. D. So he tried few stones
 ,e