240 PRINCIPLES OF RURAL ECONOMICS 



It is, of course, impossible to draw any hard-and-fast lines be- 

 tween large-, medium-, and small-scale farming. The acreage 

 of the farm is no test, because more capital may be invested and 

 more labor employed on ten acres intensively farmed than upon a 

 thousand acres extensively farmed. For purposes of discussion we 

 shall define large-scale farming as farming where there is land 

 enough, capital enough, and men enough employed to make it 

 economical for the manager to give his whole time to the work 

 of supervision and management, all the manual work being done 

 by employees working under his direction. A relatively small 

 number of men on a cattle ranch covering a wide area and hav- 

 ing considerable capital invested in stock would be equivalent 

 to a relatively large number of men on a small acreage devoted 

 to market gardening. That which marks the farm as a large 

 farm is the size of the whole business unit, and neither the 

 number of men nor the number of acres taken separately. 



By medium-scale farming is meant that style of farming, more 

 common than any other in this country, where the manager does 

 the greater part of his own work, that is, he and his family, with 

 an occasional hired man, who usually boards with the family, 

 and where the acreage is sufficient to employ the reasonable 

 working time of this labor force when equipped with the teams, 

 tools, implements, and machines which are necessary to utilize 

 that labor force to the best advantage. The acreage may be 

 small or large, according to the nature of the crops grown, but 

 it must be large enough to allow the economical use of such 

 machines, tools, etc. as are commonly used in that line of pro- 

 duction. In the grain and hay region of our central West 

 anything from one hundred to two hundred acres, say one 

 hundred sixty on the average, would meet this description. 



By small-scale farming is meant a type very common among 

 the peasants of certain European countries, and more especially in 

 Japan, China, and other countries of the Far East. This type 





