Evening star., 1940-04-22
Discusses Problem
Of Form Income
Pority Payment Plan Held
inadequate to Meet
Real Need

SSSSSAS w sV'SSe
Real Need
To the Editor OF The Star:
am amazed at the labor and genius
employed by Secretary Wallace to con-
ceal the real condition of agriculture and
still more amazed that the newspapers
never see through it. In your paper
today, you headline an Associated Press
statement Rural Wages Climb as Work
ers Decrease" You then prove this
point by reciting that on April / farm
wages were 124 per cent of the 1909-1914
level, 5 points higher than on January l
and points above April /, 1885, You
further embellish the picture with the
statement that persons working on the
farms declined from 100000 on April
l. a year ago, to 9,797,00O this year. After
all of these elaborate preliminaries, the
article then states: present wage rates
on a monthly basis without board were
said to average $36.41, and day rates
without board, ST S." Instead of heading,
Rural Wages Climb" it would have been
more proper to say Rural Wage Disgrace
to American Civilization" These farm
workers will average 300 hours per month
and under the minimum wage law they
would earn more than double this pitiful
$36,4l. But they are exempted from the
minimum wage law, which is another
disgrace to our civilization.
BY the last statement do not mean
that the farmers can afford to pay
higher wages. They cannot even afford
to pay the starvation rate of 1854 at
present prices of their products. In
another article on the same page Secre-
tary Wallace tells how he will make
campaign issues of two broad proposals
for boosting farm income and easing the
farm debt burden. He will compel the
dealers to buy a certificate which boosts
the price from the speculative gambling
level to parity" Now, what is this
parity he talks about? He has written
it three times into the law as the relative
farm income for 1909-l914 According
to his own statement in those years, farm
wages were only 500 per month without
board. According to his own bulletin,
October, 1885, the farm people as whole
received a per capita annual income of
only $3.50, while the non-farm popula-
ton received 1896. This glaring discrep-
ancy he tries to cover with hocus pocus
of relative buying power, and everybody
knows that every dollar received by the
farmers was just the same in buying
power as that received by the non-farm
population.
This whole parity proposition as he
has written it into the law, is gigantic
fraud upon the farmers and if they got
the whole thing, their wages would prob
ably rise only to about SAL or s42 per
month without board.
In the next place he is going to save
the farmers s60,00o0O0 a year by the
Jones bill, which reduces their interest
rate from 58 to 3 per cent. This would
60 to fewer than half of the farmers and
is of no benefit to tenants and farm
hands. Besides we shall see it is only
drop in the bucket to the $4,000 900 900
to which the farmers are justly entitled
1t is right, but only a nibble at the farm
problem.
Let us now see what the farmers really
ought to receive. In 1888, the last year
we had the figures, the national income,
as shown by the Commerce Department,
was $4,000 100000 This is produced
income, which are honest figures, and
farmers only received S., ,432, ,00O, 900, their
produced income. On page 479 of Agri-
cultural Statistics, 1899, Secretary wal
lace shows the gross income of the
farmers to be S9290000,000. This is
another scheme to cover up the fact that
they received S5432 100000 The gross
income" includes all the operating ex-
penses added to the net income. It is,
therefore, deception to use such figures
as farm income without any explanation.
In another column the cash income"
is shown to be s8020,O000O0. This is the
same as the gross income" with ST ,269,-
000,00 of products used on the farm sub
tracted. All of the operating expenses or
outgo, is added to the income. Now what
would be the honest parity income for
the farmers in 1898?
Twenty-Five per cent Of the adult
people of the United States are dirt
AaNA AAAS1S' N'SA - pSA SSAlg VI llIC Cllll.
dren are on the farms. Fourteen per
cent of all property value is invested in
farms. The average of these would be
81 per cent. Anybody who would say
that the farmers are not entitled to 81
per cent of the national income in 1888
is an enemy of the farmers. Twenty -one
per cent of $64 00O, 900 900 is $13440, ,0OO,-
600. That is what the farmers were en-
titled to.
Wallace's proposition, which has failed
for seven years, fully realized, would give
them only about $2,50OO00,OO0 more.
They are entitled to over $4,000 ,0OO, 900
more. If they got this $4,000, 900 900, they
would put half of our unemployed lab
orers to work producing the things they
need to buy. This would also boost the
national income and every business in
our country. This can all be accom-
plished by minimum price law like the
minimum wage law
April 16. SMITH w. BROOKHART.