GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 895 



enterprise system which has prevailed in America since the beginning of this 

 Republic. 



We have given special consideration to the new farm program proposed by 

 Secretary of Agriculture Charles F. Brannan. In our judgment, the Secretary's 

 proposals embody more rigid controls of farmers than has ever been experienced. 

 The methods of attaining a fair price for farmers producing milk, meat, and 

 poultry products contemplate the driving down of prices by Government publicity 

 to the lowest possible levels and compensating producers by direct payment from 

 the Government to make up for the prices so driven down. 



In brief, the Secretary proposes a direct subsidy to producers, and pressure to 

 reduce dairy prices as a means of lowering costs to consumers. His plan follows 

 closely the wartime subsidy program with attendant costs to taxpayers so great 

 that he has not been able to estimate them before the committees of Congress. 



We now have the Hope-Aiken Act (the Agricultural Act of 1948) which takes 

 effect January 1, 1950. The provisions of this act have not been tried in actual 

 operations. We are of the opinion that this act has many beneficial provisions, 

 and it has been rather universally supported by national farm organizations. A 

 few clarifying and beneficial amendments to the Hope-Aiken Act will be all that 

 is necessary as far as dairymen are concerned, and are all we should request at 

 this time. 



We recommend the retention by the Congress of the main features of the 

 Hope-Aiken Act, with the inclusion in this act of the following proposals of great 

 and significant concern to dairy farmers. 



(a) for the year 1949, inclusion of wages of hired farm labor in the index of prices 

 paid by farmers for commodities bought. 



(6) The inclusion in the act, for the period after January 1950, of special treat- 

 ment of milk and its products, by modification of the parity computation to 

 include subsidies in effect during the war roll-back period, and inclusion of hired 

 farm labor in the index of prices paid hy farmers for commodities bought. 



(c) Flexible support prices for milk and its products based upon full parity 

 with a minimum of 75 percent of parity following the principle of the Hope-Aiken 

 Act. 



(d) The Hope-Aiken Act should be amended so as to have a specific parity 

 formula for milk and its products which is not subject to administrative inter- 

 pretation. 



(e) As an aid to disposition of surpluses we reiterate our support of the Aiken 

 food-allotment plan for the underprivileged. That has been reintroduced bj^ 

 Senator Aiken this year, but it has not gone through any committee hearings. 

 Through this method, only those consumers who cannot afford to pay fair prices 

 would be subsidized, and it would eliminate from subsidy benefits such groups as 

 can well afford to buy their own food at parity prices to producers. 



For many years the dairy farmers of this country have striven for 

 legislation which would help bolster then- income in times of declining 

 prices yet which would grant them a great degree of freedom in their 

 individual operations. At the present time there have been in 

 operation for a number of years two programs designed to maintain a 

 better balance between the prices received by farmers for dauy 

 products and the prices which dauy farmers have to pay for com- 

 modities used in farm production and farm living. 



One program has been the utilization of market-stabilizing tech- 

 niques designed to prevent sharp and drastic reductions in dairy 

 prices below fair price levels. Under this program, before the war 

 particularly, the price-stabilization operations involved the removal 

 from the normal channels of trade and commerce of butter, cheese, 

 evaporated mdk, and dry skim milk. Since the war dairy prices 

 reached fahly high levels relative to parity ; and for 2 years not even 

 price-stabilization operations were needed to assure farmers fair 

 prices. Durmg 1949, however, prices to producers have declined to 

 where they are rapidly approaching support levels. As a matter of 

 fact in several instances they are already at that level, involving the 

 Government in purchases of butter and dry skim milk. 



91215 — 49 — ser. u, pt. 5— — 10 



