Evening star., 1935-08-13
GENERAL DIST AVOR.
Of A.A.A. TAXSEEN.
Processing Levies on Hogs
Held Contributing to Down
fall of Principle.
BY MARK SULLIVAN.

The hog is coming home to roost,
If, for the purpose of metaphor, we
may give wings to that earthly quad
ruped. He is also flying high, at least
the price of him is. And because
he is high in price he is also high
in newspaper editorials, and in head
lines which tell of housewives strikes
and meatless meals.
For the high price of pork there
are two causes. Both causes come
from A. A. A. This statement, that
both causes come from A. A. A.. is
questioned by Secretary of Agriculture
Wallace and his propagandists. At
least, they question the statement
when they are talking to the embit-
tered consumer. To him they say
that one of the causes was the drought.
But when they talk to the farmer,
as they do talk to him through the
tens of thousands of paid representa-
tiveS of A. A. A., who act as
propaganda organization, I suspect
they tell the farmer, and propably
tell him with pride. and claim credit
for it, that the whole cause of the
high price of pork is A. A. A.
One cause is the processing tax.
farmer who raises and slaughters
5 or 10 hogs and sells them to the
village meat shop or to his neigh
bors, and packers and butchers who
slaughter and dress hogs on a large
scale. all pay processing tax of
214 cents pound. Now pa cents
seems a small item. Especially does
1t seem small in comparison with
the present retail price of pork, as
paid by the housewife, which is about
as cents a pound. The A. A. A.
propagandists say or imply that if
the processing tax did not exist, if
the "a cents did not need to be paid,
the retail price of pork would still
be 42@4 cents a pound.
Tax in Disguise"
But to get the whole story let us
follow what is done with that "a
cents. The administration does not
keep it. 1t is not really tax at all.
The administration uses the word
'taX' as one of its devices for trying
to get the Supreme Court to say that
what is not tax is one.
The administration turns the 24
cents over to farmers. In all, it
amounted last year to $175,6l6,0l3.
This amount is paid by A. A. A. to
farmers. From each farmer the ad-
ministration takes a contract. The
contract requires the farmer to raise
fewer hogs. The 1884 contract re-
quired the farmer to reduce by 25 per
cent. 1t required him to raise in that
year only three hogs for every four
he had raised on the average in the
two preceding years.
That is where the real effect of the
processing tax comes in. The part
the processing tax plays in a retail
price of as cents is not pa cents.
1t is much more. No one can say
just how much more. 1t may be 5
cents a pound, or 10, or 20. 1t is as
much as the difference between As
cents and whatever would be the re-
tail price of pork if farmers were left
free to raise as many hogs as they
would raise. From the point of view
of the consumer, he is made to pay a
tax which raises the price, and this
tax is then used to make the price
still higher.
A. A. A. does not like any one to
write or talk as I am writing here
They passed law designed to prevent
it. Into one of the statutes they had
Congress pass they introduced pro-
vision making it crime for any one
to say that the increase of cost caused
by the processing tax is greater than
the amount of the tax. The law is
still in effect. But that was in the
early days of the New Deal, when the
brain trusters we're sitting pretty, and
I do not think they will now put me
in jail.
The other cause of the high price
of hogs is an artificial scarcity delib-
erately created by A. A. A. In 1888
and 1884, A. A. A bought and killed
6400,866 hogs. They made special
effort to get pregnant sows and young
pigs, so as most effectively to reduce
the future supply. The young hogs.
weighing less than 80 pounds, were
made, not into meat, but into fer