AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



in this regard in recent years. In 1882, 15.71 

 per cent, of the farms were composed solely of 

 leased land, and in 1895 the percentage was 16.42 ; 

 but at the same time, 12.88 per cent, of all land in 

 farms was leased land in 1882, and only 12.38 

 per cent, in 1895. It would appear, therefore, 

 that there was little change in the status of the 

 farmers with respect to landownership during this 

 period. 



That this high percentage of landowning farm- 

 ers is due in a large degree to the good system of 

 land credit, is indicated by the fact that the farms 

 of Prussia, are mortgaged to about half their 

 market value. And yet it may be that in this 

 high percentage of indebtedness there lies a dan- 

 ger. The indebtedness on land in Prussia in- 

 creased twenty-four per cent, during the thirteen 

 years from 1883 to 1896; and it may well be 

 feared that while the forms of landownership have 

 been retained the real ownership is gradually slip- 

 ping away from the farmers as surely as it is in 

 our own country. 



Even if the good credit system is not all that is 

 needed to enable the tenant farmers to become 

 landowners in sufficient numbers to stop the de- 

 cline in the percentage of landowning farmers, yet 

 it is certainly an important method of facilitating 

 the acquiring of landownership on the part of the 

 farmers, and in this way it is a means of check- 

 ing to some extent the decline of the class of land- 

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