GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 855 



seven times the amount of gross farm income and five times the income 

 of the producers of all raw material. 



If the present program for agriculture stands and the support price 

 is reduced to 60 percent of parity, then that will certainly reduce the 

 gross income of the farmers, and if the gross income of farmers is 

 reduced in the same propoition, the total agricultural income will be 

 approximately $20,000,000,000, and if the ratio 1-1-7 stih holds good, 

 as it has for more than the past quarter century, then the national gross 

 income would be approximately $140,000,000,000. 



At the present time the Federal budget is $41,500,000,000, and the 

 States, counties, cities and districts have budgets totaling $14,000,- 

 000,000, which together make a total tax bill of the sum of approx- 

 imately $55,000,000,000. In the name of good common sense, how 

 could 60 percent parity mean anything less than depj-ession and 

 financial chaos? 



A profitable agricultural price structure must be maintained in order 

 that the national economy be automatically maintained. 



The triple A faim program worked against the fai-mer instead of for 

 him. He accepted it because it was misrepresented to him. Leaving 

 out the big words and the confusing formulas, this is what Govern- 

 ment said to him: "Let us tell you how much to plant and how many 

 hogs to raise and we will use that power to reduce the 'surplus.' We 

 will bring about a scarcity and make the law of supply and demand 

 work for agriculture. We will get you the parity prices to which you 

 are entitled.'' 



Government did use that power to reduce domestic agricultural pro- 

 duction. At the same time, by means of its program of recipjocal 

 trade agreements and the depreciation of foreign currency, it encour- 

 aged the importation of competing farm products, so that for every 

 acre taken out of production under the triple A, we actually imported 

 the product of more than an acre of foreign agricultural products 

 which, being offered at low prices, kept forcing our domestic prices 

 down toward world prices. The "surplus," of course, was not reduced 

 and the program never got anywhere near parity prices for the farmers. 



During the war Government flatly repudiated the triple A program 

 when it stated bluntly that "parity prices for agriculture means 

 uncontrolled inflation." That was a false statement. Parity prices 

 as they are now calculated do not return even reasonable profits to 

 farmers. The truth is that prices for the food and fiber of this Nation 

 which return reasonable profits to farmers cannot truthfully be called 

 inflationary prices. Inflationary prices are not created by fair and 

 just returns, but by insufficient c^uantities of consumer goods to equal 

 the consumer demands. 



Our foreign trade should be truly reciprocal. Products we have 

 in abundance should be traded for products that we need, and should 

 be under the supervision and direction of a committee of truly 

 American statesmen. 



Therefore, we, the United Farmers of America, Inc., recommend a 

 flexible import tax on each commodity so that the amount of import 

 tax, when added to the market price of such foreign product, will 

 amount to 110 percent of the parity price of such product. This 

 import tax would vary automatically with the change in the market 

 price in this country of each commodity. 



