August, 1922 



SCIENTIFIC AGRICULTURE 



391 



other. As soon as agriculture has become 

 unremunerative no other person than its 

 present owner wants the land; the present 

 owner therefore must go on cultivating the 

 land, and this sim})ly makes the evil so much 

 worse. The landowner can't stop producing 

 and to go on producing at a loss only ag- 

 gravates his condition. 



In urban industry labor also is free to 

 move from one employment to another. A 

 laborer who can tend a machine in a cotton 

 factory can quickly learn to tend a machine 

 in any one of a great many other factories. 

 So long as he can tend his machine he does 

 not need to know much about the business, 

 for the superintendent, the foremen and 

 other officials are directing the whole organ- 

 ization. In manufacturing much of the 

 machinery is automatic or semi-automatic, so 

 that the laborers do not need to have any- 

 thing more than ordinary alertness in order 

 to hold their jobs. But the conditions are 

 altogether different in agriculture, for the 

 laborer, in order to carry on his work with 



factors will avoid the field of agriculture. 

 How can they be attracted to this funda- 

 mental field of employment.? If we look into 

 the conditions attending industrial employ- 

 ment, we shall find that if capital and labor 

 shun a certain kind of enterprise on account 

 of the risky nature or otherwise uncertain 

 character of that enterprise, and if the en- 

 terprise is one which is necessary for the 

 welfare of society, the prices obtained for 

 that particular commodity or service are 

 sufficiently high to draw capital and labor 

 into the enterprise by reason of the high 

 profits which are obtained. This would 

 seem to point the way in the case of agri- 

 culture. Until the profits in the latter are 

 considerably higher than at present capital 

 and labor will choose to enter other lines of 

 employment. Since agriculture is attended 

 by so many risks the natural result would 

 be to have the profits all the higher for 

 those who remain in it; and in order to 

 have higher profits there will have to be 

 higher prices for farm products, or else a 



satisfaction, must be thinking of his work much lower cost of production than at pres 



and planning for it. This is true whether ent — or possibly both these conditions, 



he be the owner of the farm or an ordinary Higher prices seem to be possible of at- 



employee. There is nothing automatic on tainment only through organized activity of 



the farm and the worker in order to be farmers, for the individual farmer is no 



effective must be interested in his work and match for the organized commercial men 



have detailed knowledge of the work in with whom he must deal in selling his com- 



which he is engaged. If he is handling a raodities. Until farmers can become strongly 



dairy herd or using horses, any mistake in organized, so as to be able to deal as groups 



regard to their feed or other treatment may 

 prove serious. The knowledge which a 

 farmer or farm hand must have embodies so 

 much science that a worker cannot shift from 

 a factory to a farm at will in response to 

 the economic conditions. The freedom of 

 movement of labor which is so characteristic 

 a feature of industrial employments does not 

 hold in the case of farm work. Evidently, 

 then, in the case of labor, as in the case of 

 capital, the movement into agriculture is not 

 made except under strongly pronounced in- 

 ducements acting over a considerable period 

 of time. On the contrary, the freedom of 

 movement of labor tends to drive labor away 

 from agriculture, into industrial and com- 

 mercial life where very little, if any, spe- 

 cialized training is needed in order to gain 

 admittance. 



When the returns to labor and to capital 

 are larger in other pursuits than in agricul- 

 ture, it is manifest that these productive 



with strongly intrenched commercial inter- 

 ests there is little hope that the surpluses of 

 farm supplies will sell for higher prices 

 in the markets. In order to secure an ade- 

 quate supply of labor and capital in agri- 

 culture, therefore, there must be organized 

 effort on the part of the farmers so that the 

 farm will be more profitable. The logical 

 outcome of insufficient profits for the farmer 

 will be the curtailment of production; this 

 will make itself manifested in higher prices 

 to the consumers in cities and towns, and 

 when the consumers find ultimately that they 

 will have to pay higher prices in order to 

 have their wants satisfied the time will be 

 ripe for higher prices and higher profits foV 

 the farmer. Then capital and labor will 

 turn toward the field of agriculture. 



One of the best tests of the well-being of 

 an enterprise are the rewards obtained by 

 capital and labor in it. A recent investiga- 

 tion in the United States, where the condi- 



