Askov American. [volume] (Askov, Pine County, Minn.) 1914-current, 1929-07-18
FROM OUR EXCHANGES
Editorial Comment From Other News.
papers, Which May or May Not
Conform With the Opinions
of the ASkOv American.)
THE TARIFF AFFECTS NOT AGRI-
CULTURE ALONE BUT THE
NORTHWEST AS A WHOLE
minneapolis Tribune)

1t is automatic that agriculture's
high costs and low prices. A business
is in a healthy condition when there
is comfortable margin between costs
and prices. 1t is in a precarious con-
dition when the margin between costs
: and prices becomes too tight. And
that. broadly, is agriculture's situa-
ton now.
These observations are platitudin-
Gus and universally conceded. But
we in the northwest tend to lose sight
of their implications. If there were
a decent spread between agricultural
costs and agricultural prices. our
farmers would have some surplus
money to put into circulation. That
money would stimulate trade through
out the territory. 1t would increase
the prosperity of those businesses al
ready in a prosperous condition. 1t
would stimulate and make prosperous
businesses now stagnant and on the
bOrder-line of bankruptcy. 1t would
prevent many a business headed for
the receiver from actually running up
the white flag. The increased pros
perity of these various businesses
would make for increased employment
and higher wage scales. 1t would
mean that these other businesses
would have, in turn, more money with
which to initiate new northwest enter
prises and expand their present oper-
atiOns. Thus if there were decent
spread between agricultural costs and
agricultural prices, the northwest
would now be stepping along at a
greatly accelerated pace. with pros
perity generally diffused and with ag
riculture. industry, and labor all
This is what a widened spread be-
tween agricultural costs and prices
would mean to our section of the
world. But, with an insufficient
spread, the reverse happens. and has
happened. The insufficient spread
means the foreclosure of mortgages:
the foreclosures of mortgages mean
the failure of banks; the failure of
banks means financial hardships
wrought upon people in every walk
of life. 1t means cOncomitant
failures, the deadening of initiative,
and lower scale of living all the
way around. In other words, there is
simply no dissociating the plight of
agriculture from the plight of the
community as whole. When agri-
culture goes down. it drags the whole
community down with it, When it
goes up, it pushes the whole COM
munity up.
The Tribune has manifested a great
deal of concern about the tariff. That
is because the tariff eXerts a direct
and potent influence upon this all-im-
portant question of the cost-and-price
spread" The Tribune understands
what widened spread between agri-
cultural costs and agricultural prices
would do for the northwest. 1t under
stands. too, what narrow spread
would do. Northwest prosperity ex-
pands and quickens when the spread
widenS, and contracts and crumbles
when it narrOwS. A tariff which
widened the spread would accomplish
wonders not only for agriculture but
for the whole northwest. while tariff
which narrowed it would be more
damaging than a plague That is
why, in the largest sense, The Tribune
has been pleading so insistingly for
a tariff which widens the spread
And that is why, too. in the same
sense, The Tribune has been so re-
sentful of tariff bill which pro-
poses to narrow the spread. 1t sees
at stake not only the question of agri-
cultural prosperity, but of northwest
prosperity as a whole