GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 335 



iaps to lesser degrees in others but we have made progress id all of 

 them by the recommendation. 



Mr. CoTTOx. If you have, that is Utopia and I think everybody 

 should be for it. 



Secretary Branxax. It might be, sir, but it is certainly an objective 

 "worth working for and we went to work on it. We certainl}^ have 

 demonstrated in the four or five examples that with the amount of 

 money we are now faced with spending we could accomplish all those 

 objectives. 



Mr. CoTTOX. I know it is your sincere and firm contention that 

 it would not be more costly. Taking the present system, not the 

 Aiken bill, will your plan, in your opinion, cost more or less than the 

 present system of support? 



Secretary Braxxax. Let me say first of all that it would cost less 

 than the present system, in my opinion; I think we did our best to 

 outline that in the statement which I read yesterday. I am con- 

 vinced that it would cost less than the present system in the items 

 "which we defined and made reference to. 



Mr. CoTTOX. If you added to it all these perishable items, in doUars 

 and cents it would cost more, would it not? 



Secretary Braxxax'. Let us take hogs, for example. We have a 

 statutory obligation to support hogs right now. We have a statu- 

 tory obligation to support most of those items now. I think we would 

 have a very strong pressure to support beef and lambs if they ever 

 came do^^Ti to what the prices was, at 90 percent of parity, at least 

 so we are not talking about many additional items. We are also in 

 chickens and eggs right now. 



Mr. CoTTOX. In your opinion, would the actual expenditures be 

 more or less than under the system which will take effect the first 

 day of the year under the so-called Aiken bill? 



Secretary Braxxax. If under the word "payments" in the Aiken 

 bill we could do the things we are talking about, then any difference 

 in the amount of funds involved in carrying out the program and 

 any difference in the amount of losses would be the difference between 

 the two support levels. 



In my opinion that would mean that much less money in the 

 farmer's pockets with not a great deal more benefit to them. 



Mr. CoTTOX. I realize you are taking into consideration the in- 

 terest of the national economy and the element of the farmers having 

 more money with which to purchase. But in actual expenditures 

 from the Federal Treasury, your plan would be more a drain on the 

 Treasury- than the administration of the Aiken bill, would it not? 



Secretary Braxxax. Only inasmuch as there was a difference in 

 the level of supports and a loss in the operation. The fact that there 

 is a difference in the level of support does not necessarily mean that 

 you will be in a loss operation at all. 



That again goes back to supply and demand. 



Mr. CoTTOX. Just one more question and I am done, Mr. Chair- 

 man. 



I was somewhat attracted to another commendable objective in 

 your plan, that of encouraging the family-sized farm. That is about 

 the only kind of farm we have in the area that I represent, as dis- 

 tinguished from the other States represented by some of our friends. 

 It seemed to me that after considering the situation in cotton, tobacco, 



