146 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



the gross return which the marginal land will yield and the 

 amount of wages and interest which labor and capital-goods can 

 command on other grades of land. This means, of course, that as 

 the less productive lands are resorted to the rent which the com- 

 petitors will offer for the better land will rise, and then the largest 

 net return, and hence the largest net profit per composite unit 

 of labor and capital-goods, can be gotten only by more intensive 

 culture. 



In this connection the influence of lower wages and lower 

 interest and higher rents, upon the choice of crops, should be 

 reviewed, because it often happens that a rise in rents will 

 result in the change from a crop which requires but little ex- 

 penditure for labor and capital-goods per acre to one that re- 

 quires large expenditures per acre. 



That degree of intensity of cuture which brings the largest 

 net profit to the landowning farmer or to the tenant who has a 

 fixed rent to pay seems also to be that degree of intensity 

 which makes the total amount of land, labor, capital-goods, 

 and managerial activity employed in the agricultural industry 

 most productive. It appears, therefore, that at this point there 

 is a harmony of interests between the individual and society 

 as a whole; but it would seem that the interest of the share 

 tenant is not in harmony with the interest of society as a whole 

 in this regard, for if the better grades of land are farmed as 

 extensively as the interest of the share tenant seems to dictate, 

 poorer grades of land would need to be used in order that the 

 labor and capital-goods of the country be employed, and some 

 of this labor and equipment on the marginal land would be 

 creating a smaller product than it could be made to yield if 

 employed in farming the better grades of land to a more in- 

 tensive degree ; and, therefore, while a given share tenant could 

 increase his net profit by this extensive culture, such culture 

 would reduce the total value of the agricultural productions of 

 the country as a whole. 



The interest of the share tenant is also out of harmony with 

 that of the landlord in this regard. Since it is to the interest 

 of the landlord that the share which accrues to him as rent 



