The people's voice. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1939-1969, 1940-12-04
Barriers Between
Farmers, Hungry
To Be Probed

lO do i IOUCU
WASHINGTON FP) = Investiga-
ton of the barriers between as million
hungry Americans and impoverished
farmers was lunched here November
rs by the antitrust division of the
Department of Justice.
The investigation, an announcement
stated, will be directed toward re-
straints of trade which can be pros
ecuted under the antitrust laws and
will deal with food professors, COM
mission merchants, organized produce
exchanges, truckers, and wholesale
and retail distributors.
Particular attention, it was asserted,
will be given to bread, milk meat, fish,
cheese, canned fruits and vegetables,
and fresh fruits and vegetables.
The probe, according to the depart
ment, is the second nationwide drive
against high cost items in household
expenses. The first was in the field
of housing and has resulted in SO in
dictments against 1883 defendants
and in % injunction suits.
"The occasion for the food investi-
CATION" the statement said, lis re-
cent evidence that the food industries
function badly for both consumers and
farmers.
Eat the end of the food industries
lies wholesale malnutrition among
consumers due to their inability to
afford an adequate diet. At the other
end lies population of producing
farmers who must sell an abundance
Of food at distress prices so low as to
threaten them with bankruptcy.
Between are industrial groups,
many of which are so close knit and
powerful that they have made salts
factory profits throughout the depres-
sion.
"a rough indication of the relative
strength of such groups is the fact
that professors and distributors now
receive about SO or so cents of the
average dollar which the consumer
spends for food, whereas between 1913
and 1920 they received only from 40
to 4S cents of that dollar"
The results of this, the statement
continues, are evident in the studies
of various government agencies.
According to the Bureau of Home
Economics, more than 45,O00,00O peo-
pie are limited to diets so poor that
they lack essential food elements.
These families are below the safe
ty line. Not all of them feel hunger
and not all have clinical symptoms
of deficiency diseases such as pellagra,
beri-beri or scurvy.
"But those who must live on such
diet for prolonged periods suffer
from chronic fatigue, lethargy, various
digestive disorders, and divers aches
and pains and have lowered resistance
to disease. They are caught between
low incomes and high food prices with
a practical certainty that their health
will be impaired by malnutrition.
ION a weekly expenditure of $1.25
per person per week or less, it is
impossible to avoid such
poor diet.
1.-THE reports of the national re-
sources committee indicate that more
than 100000 families spend for food
an average of only $106 per person
per week or about five cents per per-
son per meal
Another 100000 families spend
an average of $1.53 per person per
week or about seven and third cents
per person per meal and another four
and a quarter million families, an
average of $1.S3 per person per week
or between eight and nine cents per
person per meal.
More than 100000 families cannot
obtain an adequate minimum diet at
present prices and eight million addi-
tional families run serious risk of a
poor diet unless they spend their food
money cautiously and wisely. In the
aggregate, these groups constitute
more than 41q6 of the American peo-
pie"
On the other hand, the American
farmer is in jeopardy, the departments
statement continues. A federal trade |
study is cited to show
that nearly one farm in every four
was foreclosed between 1880 and 1886 |
and that while between 1918 and 1920 |
The farmer got So to 60 cents of every |
food dollar, between 1888 |
and 1889 the farmer got only 40 to |
IL cents of every such dollar.
1t was indicated that the investiga-
ion will proceed slowly because of the
TACT that the staff of the antitrust
division is still busy on other matters
t was indicated that the statement of
he department by itself was calcu-
ated to have some effect on food