144 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



farmer can manage a given number of the composite units of 

 labor and capital-goods without regard to the area on which it 

 is expended, the same conclusion will be arrived at with regard 

 to the proper degree of intensity of culture where land can be 

 had free or where a fixed rent must be paid for its use, whether 

 one adds successive units of the other factors to a given area 

 of land until the average net return per unit reaches the maxi- 

 mum, or whether one adds successive acres of land to a given 

 number of the composite units of the other factors until the 

 final increment of land adds just enough to the total product 

 to pay the fixed rent which must be paid to secure the use of 

 said increment of land. 



The conditions are practically the same where the farmer 

 owns the land which he cultivates as where he pays a fixed rent, 

 the only difference being that he has paid for the perpetual 

 use of the land, whereas the tenant pays annually for its use. 



The payment of a share rent does not tend to increase the 

 intensity of culture. The share rent increases as the total prod- 

 uct increases ; and it may be thought of as taking some fixed 

 portion, say one-third, of the product of each succeeding unit 

 of labor and capital-goods applied, so that the farmer gets 

 only two-thirds of the product of each unit, and his share reaches 

 the highest average return per unit with the same degree of 

 intensity which yields the highest average gross return per 

 unit. Hence, where the share tenants follow their own self- 

 interest, they will farm no more intensively on the best land 

 when less productive grades of land have been resorted to than 

 when only the best grade was cultivated. 



To illustrate this point, draw a curved line from A to B in 

 Fig. 8, at such a distance from lines AI'B and AB as to leave 

 two-thirds of the area of each section between the lines AB and 

 A IB. Then draw a line through the points of average net 

 returns per unit employed, in the same way as the line of average 

 gross returns was drawn. This new line of averages will reach 

 the line of maximum net returns per unit when the line AZP' 

 crosses the line A IB. The point Z will be one-third of the 

 distance from X' to X and neither to the right nor to the left 



