RISKS OF THE COTTON MARKET 149 



power. They would, if enforced, be likely to lead to 

 diplomatic complications, as did Brazil's valorization of 

 coffee or England's control over rubber. If the doctrine 

 of comparative advantage holds in cotton, its enforce- 

 ment would prove unjust discrimination against owners 

 of rich Delta and alluvial lands especially suitable for the 

 growing of long staple cotton. 



It does not seem likely that any unified organization 

 or control will ever be worked out that will enable the 

 cotton industry to control to any extent its own destiny. 

 Here, as elsewhere, in our competitive system men striv- 

 ing everywhere for their own best individual interest have 

 at times worked themselves collective ruin in the process. 

 Lack of knowledge, lack of common interests, lack of 

 plan and organization have combined with the vagaries 

 of nature and nature's insects to keep the cotton industry 

 untrammelled by regulation. 



Our survey will likely lead us to agree with A. W. 

 McLean, former director of the War Finance Corpora- 

 tion and Governor of North Carolina, that "at the pres- 

 ent time the cotton industry is the most hazardous of all 

 branches of agriculture." It is not a matter of low 

 average price alone, it is the matter of violent fluctua- 

 tions which take place in the commodity within very 

 short periods that make cotton dangerous. These fluctu- 

 ations create hazards which must be assumed by all those 

 who grow cotton. The cotton dealer and the manufac- 

 turer realize these risks and hedge against them. The 

 grower cannot hedge his cotton. He bears the ultimate 

 loss. It is these fluctuations that help to explain how 

 cotton has brought the South collectively great wealth 

 yet left the individual growers poor. 



