374 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



else is organized. If you don't plant your seed you never will 

 have a corn crop and you will have to start this thing to get results. 

 There is no reason why you should not figure up what you can 

 afford to raise hogs for to make it profitable and just as soon as 

 you do it the packers will come around and pat you on the back 

 and say. "About how much are you going to charge me for your 

 hogs this year?" 



Mr. Yoder: I don't believe that present high prices are the re- 

 sult of any organization of the farmers to get high prices or hold 

 for high prices. I would like to ask if the cause of the high prices 

 is not the result of the farmers getting tired of the low prices and 

 because corn was high and hogs too cheap to feed high priced corn 

 to ? This is the result of one organization controling both the buy- 

 ing and the selling price. In one day in the St. Joe market the 

 price of hogs went off one dollar a hundred to the farmers and the 

 price of fresh pork went up one dollar a hundred the same day. 



Mr. McTavish : I would like to say that the idea of this organ- 

 ization would not be to boost the price of living nor to make the 

 prices high. As I said before, I regret, and I believe that every 

 far-seeing swine man regrets, that hogs went as high as they did 

 this year. In the end it will be an injury to the industry. But the 

 idea is to protect our selves from absolute loss from that very thing 

 that Mr. Yoder speaks of, having the packer control the whole thing 

 and put the price to the producer down and the price to the consum- 

 er up. That is the thing we want to head off. We are in a position 

 where we have to sink or swim. "We have to protect our interests 

 the same as the packer, the same as the railroad man, or any other 

 class of men. We have our money invested in our land. We raise 

 a good crop of corn and a good crop of hogs. We feed the corn to 

 the hogs and the packer knocks the price down and we are not 

 able to realize six per cent on the money invested in our land at the 

 actual valuation and pay all our expenses during the year. What 

 man is there who can do it or is doing it? He cannot do it and 

 sell hogs on the market. All this is based on the proposition of 

 market value you understand. When the price of corn goes up 

 then the packers take the advantage because the pigs begin to come 

 in and they make the excuse of the large run on the market. The 

 weights may be low so they will not fill any more barrels of pork, 

 yet that is the excuse and they hammer down the price. 



We are working in the dark entirely now where if this organi- 

 zation was brought about it would lead to wider information. We 



