PROFITS IN AGRICULTURE 



Many of these men are also poor farmers, but they cannot be 

 expected to do as well as those working a large area. We do not find 

 the gross inefficiency among the tenants, for they must earn rent 

 which goes to the landlord, and if they receive nothing for their labor 

 they cannot live. They have no interest on which to live as does 

 the farm owner with a large investment. The country would be 

 benefited if the few inefficient farm owners on the large farms were 

 persuaded to rent their farms to enterprising tenants. They would 

 still have as much or more than they are getting, and the tenant 

 would have a good living. 



288. THE CHESTER COUNTY SURVEY* 

 BY W. J. SPILLMAN 



The markedly greater efficiency of the large as compared with the 

 small farm has been clearly demonstrated when considered from 

 the standpoint of the labor income of the farmer; but when we 

 consider the subject purely from the standpoint of the interest on 

 capital invested the story is a different one, as is seen in Table XXXII. 

 In most parts of Europe this matter is considered from the latter 

 standpoint only. 



TABLE XXXII 

 INCOME ON CAPITAL ON 378 OWNER FARMS, CHESTER COUNTY 



The agriculture of Europe is based mainly on income per acre. 

 In America more attention is given to income per farm family. The 

 reader is left to himself to judge whether it is better for the country 

 as a whole that our agriculture should be efficient from the stand- 

 point of the people on the farm or from the standpoint of the capitalist 

 who owns the land. Fortunately, as yet, in this country the capi- 

 talist and the farmer are frequently the same, but even where this 

 is the case it is the income per farm family rather than the percentage 



1 Adapted from Bulletin 341, United States Department of Agriculture, pp. 66-71. 



