POSTWAR READJUSTMENTS IN AGRICULTURE 5 



been in progress for the country as a whole, but the proportion of Massachusetts 

 farmers in the older age groups is higher, even allowing for a greater amount of 

 owner operation. 



As will be seen from Table 1, farm operators in the age group of 45 and over 

 represented 71.3 percent of the total number in Massachusetts as compared with 

 58.3 percent for the United States as a whole. The same comparison for the age 

 group of 55 and over indicates 45.5 percent and 33.8 percent respectively. Recent 

 rural surveys conducted by the College confirm this situation, as well as the fact 

 that a number of farms drop out of use after the death of an aged operator be- 

 cause of insufficient numbers of young people willing to undertake farming. It 

 must of course be admitted that in some cases tenure problems and lack of capital 

 exert an important influence, but by and large the fundamental difficulty is that 

 many farms have ceased to be efficient economic family units. 



The extent to which a number of farms in Massachusetts fail to come up to 

 the level required for an adequate standard of living is demonstrated in Chart 1. 

 On the basis of the 1940 Census of Agriculture, there were 31,897 farms in Massa- 



S & o o 



XVERA&e. Sa3y153.e4 



30,868 TARMS REPORTING 



Chart 1. Massachusetts Farms Classified on the Basis of Type and Value of Output. 

 Source: U. S. Census, 1940. 



