CHAPTER IX 



AN analysis of beef production discloses similai 

 conditions to those of pork, except perhaps in those 

 areas in the West and Southwest, where cattle may 

 be grazed the entire year on free range or very cheap 

 land. Under such conditions, the labor element is re- 

 duced to the minimum, and the expense of housing 

 and machinery is nominal. These areas should be de- 

 voted exclusively to the breeding and preparing of 

 cattle for the feed yards the cattle to be fattened 

 on the farms in the corn growing section. This plan 

 would have been followed, as a matter of course, had 

 not the meat industry been monopolized, which elimi- 

 nated profits in the feeding business. 



The Food Administration should at once appoint 

 a competent commission thoroughly to classify all cat- 

 tle. To the end, first, that the farmer may know 

 in just what class any animal he has belongs hence, 

 what price it should bring. At present, he can hardly 

 make a rational guess. 



In an investigation made, when the grading bill 

 was before Congress, it was alleged that the elevators 

 were buying millions of bushels of grain as of one 

 grade, and shipping it out and selling the same on a 

 much higher grade, thus deceiving and defrauding 

 the farmers, and misleading and imposing upon the 

 consumers. The packers seem to have been following 



41 



