70 EUKAL LIFE IN CAl^ADA 



machinery as a matter of course. But why has there 

 not also come fuller satisfaction with farm conditions ? 

 Why have we not, while the city grows, at least a stable 

 farm population, with greatly enlarged production per 

 capita, with increasing rural wealth, together with 

 decreasing prices of farm produce, and with greatly 

 enhanced leisure for better living on the farm ? 



The world's markets are not glutted with farm goods ; 

 the reverse is the case. Prices of farm products have 

 not decreased, but have risen greatly. The steady, gen- 

 eral upward trend of all prices is ultimately due to the 

 cheapening of the standard of value — gold. But the 

 proportionate increase in price of one great class of 

 products above another is due to subsidiary causes. The 

 incidence of higher prices upon those with fixed earn- 

 ings is so severe as to constitute the greatest economic 

 difficulty of our time. 



Now, amidst all the increase in the cost of living, 

 that due to enhanced prices of commodities from the 

 farm stands easily first. In the year 1897, when the 

 cost of living was at the lowest point reached for a 

 generation, the index figure for all wholesale prices in 

 Canada stood at 92.2. But the average index figure 

 for all farm produce was still lower, namely, 86.7. 

 Two years later, when the average index figure for all 

 commodities throughout Canada stood almost exactly 

 at par, 100.1, the figure for all farm produce through- 

 out Canada had risen more rapidly and stood at 96.7. 

 In 1903 the general index figure for all products and 

 the index figure for all farm products had become 

 almost identical, 110.5 for the former, and 110.9 for 

 the latter. By 1907 the index figure for all commodi- 

 ties had mounted to 126.2, but that for agricultural com- 



