Browning chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1941-1953, 1947-05-16
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hin WASHINGTON
~! BY WolfeS Sheod
llnflationarY Price Trend
Worrying Farm Leaders
WNU Washington Bureau
1916 Eye ST., N. W.

pinch of high prices and paying the
penalty for whatever part they
played In kicking out price controls.
Executive committees of three Of
the four major farm organizations,
meeting here recently, expressed
grave concern" over the price sit
iuation and adopted a resolution in
which they viewed the present in
ifiationary price trends" with alarm
and urged leaders in industry, agri-
culture, labor and government to
"join in concerted effort to halt this
dangerous trend"
In the first week of last November
your home town reporter wrote in
this column concerning the artificial
meat shortage and the withholding
OF livestock from the markets by
farmers. 1.-THE shortsighted
farmers who participated in this
conspiracy, this strike against price
control, will not gain in the long
run. As meat goes up prices Of
other farm produce likely will 60
down and most surely the prices Of
commodities that farmers buy will
rise and stay up for some time
It's strike for higher prices, iden-
tically the same as when the la
borer walks of his job in a strike
for higher wages. The farmer gains
nothing and neither does the Ia
borer, for both are helping to build
up the spiral Of increasing cost Of
living for everything they buy"
Some OF our farmer friends
chided us about that column and
said, mo, it's not strike, it's good
business. While the leaders of the
farm groups meeting here, the
Farm Bureau federation, the Ma
tional Grange and the National Co
operatives, publicly attempted to
clear their own skirts of any blame
for the present high prices by adopt
ing a resolution to that effect, pri-
vately and off the record they ad-
mitted their sense of guilt. They
further sought to bubble somewhat
by protesting against the practice
of government and private groups
to use the 1859 period as a base
for making price comparisons,
claiming that farm prices during
that period were 16 per cent below
parity. So what? They are now,
many Of them, 200 per cent and
more above parity.
Payments Mean Controls'
The farm leaders were able to
agree upon parts of their program
which they now are presenting to
the house agricultural committee in
hearings ON long range farm pro-
gram. The grange wants to do
something now about parity prices
but the Farm Bureau would rather
wait until next year when present
parity ratios expire. Some were
hopeful of eliminating the New Deal
triple A control program and were
somewhat staggered when Cong.
Clifford r. Hope of Kansas, Repub-
lican chairman Of the house agri-
cultural committee, bluntly told
them, "Price stability is impossible
unless farmers accept controls"
Which means continued acreage
controls, support prices, conserva-
ton controls, etc.
The farm leaders expressed jeal-
GUS concern over proposed slashing
Of department Of agriculture budg.
cts, and although they agreed that
some budgets must be cut perhaps
20 per cent they definitely wanted
no cuts in REA school lunches, re-
search and marketing.
Indicating the split in the thinking
OF the farm. group, one leader, of
the record, told your home town re-
porter, eyes, we took our usual
slap at labor and demanded some
pretty drastic labor controls. If all
of US could only realize that the
workers are our best customers,
and would work together instead Of
letting the big boys continually
drive a wedge between us, we
would all be better off.
Nationwide Monopoly
"Suppose, for instance" he said,
IF in our fight for new and higher
parity price on farm commodities
congress would fix basic price and
then say, OK, that price is all right
for New York, Illinois, Montana,
Kansas or Nebraska, but we'll cut
1t 20 per cent for Oklahoma and
Texas because living is cheaper
there; we'll cut it 80 per cent for
Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama
and Georgia; we'll give Kentucky
and Tennessee a 10 per cent cut,
and so on according to the index of
living in each state I wonder what
our farmers would think of that?"
"And yet our 80 per cent Of parity
guarantee by the government is the
result Of our industry-wide bargain
ing power, the same price across
the country. It's floor under our
wages. Call It monopolistic II you
want to. That's what we have and
we're trying for q better bargain.
Why We should try to deny the same
industry-wide bargaining right for
labor ! don't know, but We have
taken that stand"
Your home town reporter notes
that this represents some different
thinking from that usually expressed
at farm conferences.