59 8 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



of new cars is advertised and assurance is given that all cars are being 

 put in condition to handle bulk grain. In some cases large numbers 

 of stock cars are being temporarily fitted up for handling grain. As 

 far as possible, foreign empties are being held by the grain-carrying 

 roads, and country sidings are being filled with empties for the first 

 rush. 



It is the consensus that the increase in car supply does not keep 

 pace from year to year with increasing need for cars. 



Only 58 . i per cent of the wheat produced is shipped out of the 

 county where grown, and on this basis the number of cars required 

 to move the winter wheat crop of the United States would be 304,444 

 and 178,948, for that of seven most important wheat-growing states. 

 On the same basis it would require approximately 432,000 cars to 

 move the entire wheat crop of the United States. 



The total number of box cars owned by all the roads in the United 

 States June 30, 1911 (the last report available), was 990,313. Taking 

 15 of the principal roads in the seven states covered by our investiga- 

 tions, we find that they had on July 30, 1913, 60,446 miles of road and 

 223,487 box cars. Their aggregate mileage increase for the two years 

 from June 30, 1911, to June 30, 1913, was 3 per cent, the increase in 

 the number of their box cars, 3 per cent, and the increase in the tonnage 

 capacity of their box cars, 7? per cent. The figures for individual 

 roads vary from a decrease of 14 per cent in the number of box cars 

 to an increase of 3 2 per cent, and in tonnage capacity from a decrease 

 of 5 per cent to an increase of 50 per cent. These 15 roads contain 

 approximately 25 per cent of the entire mileage of the United States 

 and own approximately 22 per cent of all the box cars. The seven 

 states in question produce approximately 40 per cent of all the wheat 

 of the United States. What the percentage of increase is over the 

 1911 crop is hard to determine for the area served by these 15 rail- 

 roads, but it is safe to say that it has been far greater than the per- 

 centage of increase in car supply, inasmuch as the estimated yield of 

 winter wheat for the entire United States for 1914 exceeds the 1911 

 crop by 52 per cent, and the increase in car supply during 1913-14 

 has been below normal throughout the country. 



These figures are given, not as furnishing an exact formula for 

 determining the number of cars needed to move this year's wheat 

 crop and for estimating the shortage in number of cars, but as indi- 

 cating some of the factors to be taken into consideration in the problem 

 of car supply and car shortage. Other factors are these: The wheat 



