ECONOMICS OF THE FISHERIES 297 



lumber which at an estimated value of $28 per M. would amount to $8,- 

 896,000, or 4.2 times the average value of fish production of 1936-40 (4.8 

 times the 1940 value, $1,865,000, Table 24). 



Figures of capital investment are not available, but it is probable that the 

 wealth produced by agriculture, forestry, and manufacture results from the 

 emplojonent of both labor and a substantial amount of capital, while that 

 produced by the fisheries is mainly produced by labor. It is not possible from 

 the data at our disposal to make a more rigorous comparison of the fisheries 

 with agriculture, forestry, and manufacturing as sources of wealth. The cost 

 of operations and the employment of shore labor and the amount of wages 

 paid in the fisheries on the one hand, and the secondary sales values of fish 

 and farm, forest, or manufactured products on the other, are not ascertain- 

 able so as to make possible an over-all comparison of values to the region 

 with any satisfactory degree of accuracy. 



Even though wealth produced locally may diffuse throughout the coastal 

 region, it is misleading to apply the fishery figures to all the twenty-one 

 counties, many of which are so situated that they cannot be fishing communi- 

 ties more than incidentally. If we set up the counties in descending order of 

 value of fish product as they are in Table i, the comparisons are more 

 illuminating. 



Here we see that the greater part of the value of fish production is in four 

 counties, Carteret, Dare, Brunswick, and Pamlico. In only two of these, 

 namely, Carteret and Dare, are the fisheries the leading source of income 

 from natural resources or manufacturing, and only in Dare is the value of 

 fish greater than farm income and manufacturing combined. It may be that 

 the new income from "The Lost Colony" pageant will be an important item 

 in Dare County, though of doubtful permanency. No figures are available 

 for the revenue brought into the coastal counties by sports fishermen, which 

 may be an important item in Currituck, Dare, Hyde, Carteret, and possibly 

 Brunswick. 



Recapitulation. An attempt is made in Table 2 to set up an over-all com- 

 parison of the twenty-one coastal counties. In this table the ranks of the 

 counties in fourteen categories of measurement are arranged, those of a 

 favorable nature in descending order, and those of an unfavorable nature 

 (per cent of farm mortgages, of farm tenancy, of houses in need of major 

 repair, and population per dwelling unit) in ascending order, so that "best" 

 is No. I and "worst" is No. 21 in each column. Since the quantities ranked 

 are not absolutes, but relatives, i.e., per cents and per capitas, they are not 

 affected by size or population of counties. No attempt is made here to weight 

 the various indices for relative importance; the averages may be distorted 

 by the inclusion of so much data on housing and other characteristics, and the 



