14 WE FARM FOR A HOBBY 



boughten food had risen to an average of $5.90 

 per week. As the government figures on the cost 

 of commodities cited in the previous paragraph 

 suggest, this increase is practically all price not 

 kind or quality; the higher cost of living imposed 

 on us as a cure for poverty. All materials and sup- 

 plies used cost more than they did five or even 

 three years ago and we employ two days more labor. 



In these figures every dollar that went into the 

 farm is reckoned as expense although a good many 

 such dollars were in fact either capital investment 

 or prepaid expense: the cost of fencing a pasture 

 or planting a hay field should properly be spread 

 over five or ten years. No account is taken of the 

 vastly improved physical condition of Medlock 

 Farm; nor of the inventory which from a four- 

 hundred-dollar beginning has grown to an "abso- 

 lute auction" value of twelve to fifteen hundred 

 dollars. 



Conversely, if we had chosen to lay off the hired 

 man and save his wages, where would we be today? 

 If the increased prices of the foodstuffs we still 

 have to buy are an indication we would be spend- 

 ing twenty-eight to thirty dollars a week for food. 

 Even if the incidental maintenance expenses of 

 the property remained the same, we would now 

 be saving only a part of the man's wages and 

 we would have nothing to show for our pains or 

 his lost time. However, it is a certainty that with- 



