SOME ECONOMIC INTERESTS 143 



factors, one furnishing land, the other labor and equipment, and 

 we have, therefore, the landlord and tenant relation. Farm- 

 management studies show almost invariably that tenant farmers 

 make good labor incomes, and no little care should be taken in 

 disturbing a system not adverse to public policy which with all 

 its faults is distinctly profitable to the farmer. 



Country-life improvement may indeed be hindered in its 

 cooperative aspect by the presence of the shifting tenant, but an 

 even more fundamental wrong may be done by striking at the 

 productivity of agriculture itself in the attempt to eliminate this 

 sort of farmer. Commonly it is assumed that tenancy is a step- 

 ping-stone to ultimate land ownership. The young farmer or 

 the needy farmer may come to own a farm through a preliminary 

 period spent as a tenant farmer, or he may attain full ownership 

 through the mortgage-indebtedness route. Comparing only the 

 more superficial features of these two methods of reaching the 

 same end and we have the following results. Through having 

 the stimulus to industry which comes from ownership and 

 through directing his business at will, the mortgagor is ad- 

 vantaged, but he is limited in his farm operations through having 

 invested his capital in land. On the other hand, the tenant leaves 

 to the landlord the burden of carrying all the unproductive farm 

 parts, such as buildings, fences, lanes, wood lot, etc. He is 

 further advantaged through putting all his capital into livestock 

 and equipment, thus being enabled to operate to the maximum 

 of profitableness. He gains nothing, however, by the apprecia- 

 tion in value of land. 



The suppression of tenancy restricts the young farmer or the 

 impecunious farmer to alternatives which may prove hurtful 

 from the business standpoint. The going in debt for a full-sized 

 farm, as we have seen, is likely to leave the farmer short-handed 

 in the means for the operation of this farm. Another alternative 

 is the little farm one which he is able to pay for and yet have 

 some means left over but every study of the little farm has con- 

 vinced the student of the utter unprofitableness of this style of 

 farming. Farm machinery is standardized in size to the needs of 

 the full-sized farm ; a profitable number of labor hours for man 

 or team can be found only upon the full-sized farm. Insufficient 

 variations of enterprises and too high costs in overhead expenses 



