The producers news. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1918-1937, 1923-05-04

trmS nave been contracting their bus
mess and credits during the past two
years. The War Finance Corporation
put approximately S6O,OOO,OOO in new
money into these states during the
same time. 1t is true that the large
city banks may show an artificial IL
quotation, caused by compelling the
small country banks to transfer their
debts from them over to the War FL
nance Corporation. This arrangement
enabled the large city banks to lioui-
date, with the help of the War FL
nance Corporation, a very large per
centage of their slow and doubtful
farmers paper which was held by
them as collateral to country bank OBJ
legations.
Based on the Department of Labor
index figures for wholesale prices COW
ering 404 articles and making an ay
erage of these, the farmer should be
receiving S1.63 for his No. 1 northern
spring wheat on the Chicago market
instead of SIPS, which he received
as of November /, 1922. Since that
time wheat has gone down to about
S1.20. Department of Agriculture re-
ports that the farmer, based on pur-
chasing power, is receiving approx
mately so cents a bushel less for his
wheat now then he should be receiving
1t is pertinent to ask here just why
{ the prices of farm products are so
low when the price of everything
which the farmer is purchasing is al
most at war level. A study of the
situation will reveal the 1acu Cnat the
ten-year average of GA per cent IF
the annual grain crop which we send
abroad to meet the general trade price
level of the world in competition with
the products of the cheaper lands and
labor Of other countries-with the
poems, the Hindus, and the peasants
of Europe automatically fixes the
price of the remaining ga per cent
which we consume at home. That 6
per cent grain surplus is the cause of
the tragic difficulties now facing T.
100000 American farm owners.
If wheat were local problem, the
determination of all the factors that
influence prices and should guide pro-
duction would be a simple matter.
But the United States is one of the
fourteen countries that export a sur
plus of this crop. Australia, New
Zealand, upper Egypt, India, Asia
Minor, Canada, and Argentina are
heavy exporters of wheaat while less
er amounts are exported from Chill
and Uruguay and in normal years
there are substantial exports from
Rumania, Bulgaria, and Russia, with
moderate exports from AUSTRIA Hung
airy. The Canadian export surplus
follows very closely after the Ameri-
can shipments in time of arrival in
! the foreign market. On its heels
come the Argentine crop and the Au-
stralian and New Zealand crops, while
little later and before the American
export movement is completed India
comes into the market with an amount
equal to about one-third of the Amer
lean export surplus. Chilli, upper
Egypt, and Asia Minor likewise con-
tribute a surplus, the effect of which
is to launch against the American ex-
port movement a weight of normal
wheat exports from other countries
running about 323,O00,000 bushels of
wheat. This tremendous volumne,
nearly twice the amount of wheat ex-
ported by the United States, must ne
cessarily exert a powerful influence
upon the conditions surrounding
wheat production at home and upon
the domestic price, and it serves to
explain why the worlds wheat price
is made in Liverpool and not in the
United States.
The price of the 6 per cent grain
surplus sold abroad is low today be-
/ e 4 svan y esc
ing power of European currency, tar
iff walls, the cheap labor and mater
ials on the world market, and the
small amount of gold or credit in Eu-
rope which can be exchanged for ou1
goods. And so the price which is re-
ceived for his per cent goes lower
and lower and the price which the
American farmer gets for his "a pei
cent also gets lower and lower, until
TODAY the farmers of the Northwest
are bankrupt. Foreclosures are ev-
ervwhere, suicides are common, farm
ers and their families are giving uI
bv the hundreds and packing a few
old pieces of furniture in their ole
wagons and starting out-God knows
wherel Can the American Govern
ment, which spent millions of dollars
in getting these farmers to take VI
the idle lands, stand by and allow dis
integration on such wholesale basis
to go on?
The large corporate units of pro
) duction are now able to take care o.
! themselves e They even succeed il
! getting higher and higher tariff leg
: islation to protect themselves while l1l
f the farmer is left unprotected; IN.
t financial disease of Europe is allowed
to enter America to disorganize, de
moralize, and corrupt our most i'm
! nortant misunderstanding If w
i protect the manufacturers OF tn
. United States against the comP Pc. =
E of cheap labor and merchandise 0
t Europe and the world, why should no
' the farmer class-a great deal me, NOR
E vital to our welfare than any other-
: be protected in the only way he ca
S be protected against the con: compe 1lo,.I
4 ,,,o,.Iva+ Tho Government should Sue