Plentywood herald. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1908-current, 1927-08-19
THE FARMERS BEST WAY OUT

Dean Russell Of Wisconsin College
OF Agriculture says: Two things
have hit the farmer hard but the
same things have hit business. They
are increase In cost OF production
and decline in prices which latter
has been more drastic In farm pro
ducts thar manufactured products.
The farmers political friends say
salvation can be found through legis.
latton. Our legislative doctors pro
pose price control. The difficulty
with this is price control always
means price elevation which always
produces expansion in production and
IL this occurs without expansion In
consumption you have inevitable de-
cline In prices. The remedy works to
produce the very opposite result
from that intended.
Another legislative panacea would
make 1t easier to borrow, as II run
ming into debt was the solution OF the
difficulty. There are farmers who
wish 1t had not been quite SO easy to
borrow because the inevitable day
comes when they have to pay princi-
pal and interest. The third legisla.
tive remedy would make easier the
pathway for cooperative endeavor.
All you have to do is to wave the
magic wand Cooperation and all the
farmers diff culties will Immediately
disappear. l wonder II there Is any
government that can make people CO.
operate. The success Of cooperative
effort will lie in organization from the
bottom up rather than from the top
down and 1t will take q decade or two
for the results to be felt.
1.-THE farmers have at hand a
remedy that can be utilized i'm
mediately with the definite knowledge
that It will secure far better results,
II they will take a leaf out Of present
day business methods they will have
relief in agriculture they will not have
to wait for. Business has suffered
the same as the farmer. yet business
came through In q way that Ii far
ahead Of the farmer. This has been
brought about through industrial
efficiency, through improvement OF
methods. They have increased labor
output per unit to the degree the costs
Of production have actually been re
duced by better methods Of carrying
on work. Industrial enterprises ON Q
large scale are spending millions on
research. In ten years automobile
output per worker has increased 172
per cent, tires eli per cent. oil SO
per cent, cement 81 per cent.
Compare that with others. The
packers have increased only q per
cent. sugar refining 28 per cent, boots
and shoes only 6 per cent. There has
been an increase in agriculture since
1918 OF 20 per cent. 1t IL doubtful that
business has any such opportunity a.
exists In agriculture to reduce cost
Of production through improved meth
DDS. Take corn,-Iowa shows a varia-
ton In cost Of production from fifteen
cents to seventy-lve cents Z bushel. In
Illinois the cost of producing corr on
80 acre fields was reduced from fifty
two cents to twenty cents a bushel.
The manufacturer who had 1t within
lis power to reduce production costs
from flfty-two to thirty cents per unit
would be tickled to death with the
opportunity Of meeting competition
under these conditions.
Tho way out for the farmer IL ~
to become . business man. (2) to
adopt business methods, to adapt
himself to the same kind Of conditions
and be ~ efficiently mobile ~ IL our
manufacturer or u business man In
the ordinary channels OF his trade,
~ to rely less upon political
promises and more upon individual
initiative. ~ to work toward co
operative e%ndeavor. but in the mean.
time not to wait for cooperative On.
dsavor to solve all OF these problems
because individually he can do some
thing al the present time"