Missouri Farm Management Association. 277 



cost us seven and one-half cents per hour. If our horse only 

 works one thousand hours per year the labor cost would be 

 increased to nine cents per hour. Our records will show us that 

 there are many of our horses that are not working even one thou- 

 sand hours per year, and this means a large increase in the cost 

 of the work which those horses are doing. This will cause us to 

 ■make an effort to so plan our work that we can use our horses 

 a maximum number of hours per year. One farm showed by its 

 record that there were many weeks during the year when the 

 horses did not work at all. It does not take many such weeks 

 to make the labor cost run up pretty high. 



A similar study can be made of the work which our men 

 put in. If we have a workman on the farm it is very important, 

 from the standpoint of the cost per hour of his work, that he put 

 in full days and regular time. We will fmd many days when we 

 do not even put in one-half time. The average time put in per 

 workday on some Missouri farms, where the men are hard 

 workers and work probably as long days as any of us would care 

 to, was nine and nine-tenths hours. This does not bear out the 

 statement that we work twelve or fifteen hours per day on the 

 farm. This is due to the fact that there are many days in sum- 

 mer and winter that we do not work very long. If we expect to 

 get our labor at a minimum figure we must expect to use that 

 labor a maximum number of hours per year, for it costs just so 

 much to hire a workman. The cost of man labor under average 

 conditions, where the wage rate is from twenty-two to twenty- 

 five dollars per month and board, is about fourteen cents per 

 hour — the average workman working about three thousand 

 hours per year. 



Another thing which the record will show us is the im- 

 portance of the labor cost in connection with the growing of 

 farm crops. The labor cost is the largest single item in con- 

 nection with farm crops, and many of us do not charge our crops 

 average wage rates for the work we put in on them. The cost 

 is about 114.50 on one hundred-dollar land, with money at five 

 per cent to grow an acre of corn. More than one-half this 

 charge is the labor charge. 



With man labor costing us fourteen cents per hour and 

 horse labor between eight and nine cents on the average farm, 

 we can appreciate the importance of one man working a good 

 many horses and using large tools, thus saving man labor be- 

 cause of its expensiveness. 



