A FALSE OUTLOOK 103 



the farmers that the way to combat the unfavourable 

 economic conditions which had sprung up, was to 

 create a stronger set of favourable conditions ; 

 not to reduce efficiency, but to increase efficiency, 

 and so to obtain greater yields. 



Left to themselves the farmers did the obvious : 

 the largest recurring expense was the weekly wage 

 bill, and so they cut it down, and with it the output. 

 That is to say, not only did we fail to maintain our 

 existing degree of qualitative efficiency such as it 

 was, but adopted, or rather drifted, for the want of 

 guidance by true national economists, into a system 

 of quantitative efficiency — the system followed by 

 the wheat kings, the cattle kings, the sheep miUion- 

 aires of Western America, the Argentine, Austraha. 



In sixty years over 4,000,000 acres of our land 

 have gone back to grass. And the most disquieting 

 factor is that while the nations with vast territories 

 of comparatively cheap land are accepting the 

 principle of qualitative efficiency and pass laws to 

 establish closer settlement and a great system of 

 agricultural education for all, in this country where 

 land is limited, the process of arable land reverting 

 to grass is still going on. 



The false outlook created in the nation by a 

 wrongly conceived system of national economy pro- 

 duced a whole crop of adverse conditions. 



At the bottom we have the labourer, poorly paid, 

 poorly housed, poorly fed, and without prospects 

 of improving his condition, but generally taking 

 care, by sending his children to the town, that they 

 at least shall have a better chance of life than has 

 been his lot. At the top is the far too common case 



