INCREASE OF AMERICAN LAND VALUES 495 



The federal government in Part I. in the Report on the Lumher 

 Industry takes up the problem in very great detail. While recognizing 

 the difficulty of making a definite statement regarding the extent to 

 which the timber land has increased in value, the writers of the report 

 are nevertheless struck by the extent of the increase.^ 



The value of timber varies so extremely, according to location, species, 

 quality and stand, that it is impossible to measure accurately the average amount 

 of the advance. For the purpose of this report it is not necessary so to measure 

 it. The comparative figures hereafter given are not intended to represent the 

 average values of any kind of timber or to establish in any sense a timber price. 



That the increase has been nothing less than enormous is recognized by the 

 men most familiar with the business. In speaking of the rise of prices in the 

 last twenty years they refer to changes from 12i cents to $4.00 per thousand; 

 from 10 cents to $3.00 a thousand; from $5.00 to $20.00 an acre; 300 per cent, 

 in ten years; from $1.50 to $20.00 an acre; from 50 cents to $3.00 per thousand. 

 These figures are for southern pine. In cypress: from 15 cents to $5.00 a thou- 

 sand. In the Lake states men in the business similarly speak of increases from 

 "no market value" (hemlock and hardwoods) to $4.00 to $10.00 a thousand; 

 from $2.00 to $6.00 a thousand (hardwoods). In the Pacific-Northwest similar 

 general statements are made of rises in value, such as 15 cents to $2.50 a thou- 

 sand; 10 cents to $2.50 a thousand; "no market value" to $2.50 a thousand; 

 75 cents to $2.50 a thousand. 



While these statements give no accurate measure of the general rise of 

 stumpage values, they do show that, according to this report of lumbermen, such 

 rise during the last twenty or thirty years has been enormous.' 



There are obvious difficulties in the way of setting any definite 

 limitation on the increase in the value of timber lands. 



The rise in stumpage values is likely to be greatest when a new region or a 

 new species is just beginning to attract attention. "When timber is selling by 

 the acre at rates equivalent to ten cents a thousand, it may rise almost at once 

 to fifty cents a thousand. The increase on each thousand feet in such a case is 

 unimportant; yet it is an advance of four hundred per cent.* 



Eoughly, during the decade ending with 1907 or 1908 (the period 

 immediately before the industrial depression) the federal investigation 

 indicates that " the value of a given piece of southern pine taken at 

 random is likely to have increased in any ratio from threefold to ten- 

 fold."^ The investigators found instances of even greater increases. 

 For example, tracts which sold by the acre at ten or fifteen cents a 

 thousand feet had advanced twenty, or even thirty fold, in ten years; 

 but in general these figures seem to hold fairly true. In the Lake 

 region " the general ratio of advance of timber values during the last 

 ten or twenty years has probably been less than in the south. Perhaps 



='"The Lumber Industry, Part I., Standing Timber," Washington, Govern- 

 ment Printing Office, 1913. 

 "Ihid., p. 25. 

 *Ihid., p. 214. 

 ^Ilid., p. 214. 



