ECONOMIC FACTORS 243 



opposite tendency appears consumption falls to a simpler standard 

 since any surplus represents hard cash which is required to meet 

 the extra charges due to rising land values and rents. However, 

 the general reduction of consumption in the producing districts 

 under these conditions is liable to be counteracted by causes working 

 in the opposite direction ; the increased prices for produce may 

 leave a margin above the additional expenses, resulting in increased 

 agricultural prosperity and a consequent rise in the standard of 

 living. The rise in the rates of wages paid to agricultural labourers, 

 which is at present observable in point of fact almost everywhere 

 among European populations, may lead to some improvement in 

 the notoriously low standard of living hitherto prevailing in this 

 class throughout Europe. 



^One of the first results of such an improvement in the standard 

 is to raise the heretofore meagre per capita consumption of animal 

 foodstuffs. On the whole, therefore, rising prices for agricultural 

 produce may result in an increased per capita consumption of animal 

 foodstuffs in the producing districts of Europe ; and so far from 

 causing increased supplies of these foodstuffs to flow from them to 

 the towns, may have the opposite effect in reducing the marketable 

 surplus remaining above local consumption. 1 



The consumption of animal foodstuffs tends to vary also with the 

 severity of the climate ; the colder the climate the greater the 

 physical need for a high proportion of animal foodstuffs in the diet. 

 Now in both Europe and North America there has been some move- 

 ment of the " centre of gravity " of the population in recent times 

 consequent upon the development of manufacturing and commercial 

 centres more towards the colder North than the wanner South in 

 each continent. In Europe also the northward movement oi 

 .population has been assisted by the clearing of forests and the 

 draining of marshes. Nevertheless, the movement in this continent 

 has been in general a slow one, and though still in progress, is not 



1 Of course the total as opposed to the per capita consumption in the pro- 

 ducing districts would be reduced, if improvements in the methods of pro- 

 duction were to lead to a greater production per head, if fewer persons were 

 employed in producing a given quantity of foodstuffs. Now to some extent 

 this has already happened, because the business of food production for the 

 world appears to be carried on by a constantly declining proportion of the 

 world's population, at any rate among the white peoples. However, this 

 change is greater in appearance than in reality because many elaborating 

 processes formerly conducted in the country districts have been transferred 

 to town factories. 



It has been pointed out (Part I. Chap, x.) that, whereas the application of 

 agricultural machinery has done much towards increasing the efficiency of 

 production of cereal foodstuffs, hitherto little has been done directly in this 

 way in the production of animal foodstuffs except in dairying. Labour 

 charges threaten more and more to be the chief item of expense in the pro- 

 duction of animal foodstuffs which, when wages are rising, works therefore 

 under an increasing comparative disadvantage. Thus an increasing pro- 

 portion of the available agricultural labour tends to be diverted to the stock- 

 rearing industries in which the conditions aie favourable to a higher per 

 capita consumption of animal foodstuffs among the producers. 



