viii PREFACE 



vital, therefore, that the problems in this field be discussed with 

 sanity and with understanding. This book represents an earnest 

 effort to select and organize such facts as will lead to this kind of a 

 discussion of the subject. As cities increase in size, as the farm 

 population proportionately decreases, we are destined to hear all 

 sorts of proposals looking to a cheaper food supply for the benefit 

 of the city dweller. Doubtless some of these proposals will have 

 considerable merit; and doubtless others will be fraught with 

 insidious danger, such as the proposal heard even now to place 

 on our soil a race of Oriental laborers, with lower standards of living 

 than our own. 



The farmers of America are, up to the present moment, not so 

 well mobilized as the persons in the other great industries and 

 trades. But they are rapidly beginning to assume more conscious 

 direction of the processes of production, and are asking for a wider 

 influence in the economic and political life of the nation. For 

 these reasons the study of Agricultural Economics is one of very 

 great importance, both to the dweller in the open country and to 

 his city cousin. 



It has been said that when a problem is once clearly stated it 

 is already partly solved. So the major effort of this book is to 

 state problems clearly, in order that their final solution may be 

 promoted. It is hoped that the casual reader will find these prob- 

 lems interesting. The serious student, I trust, will find their study 

 both interesting and profitable. 



JAMES ERNEST BOYLE. 

 ITHACA, NEW YORK, 

 January, 1921. 



