PART V. FARM ECONOMICS 



CHAPTER XXIV 

 FARM AND HOME MANAGEMENT 



FARMING, like banking or running a railroad, requires 

 good business management. Not hard work alone, but 

 careful planning is necessary to success. Brains are com- 

 ing to be quite as essential as muscle on a modern farm. 



1. Planning the Farm and Its Work 



In Europe, land is high and labor cheap; in the United 

 States, land is comparatively cheap and labor expensive. 

 The first principle for the American farmer therefore is 

 so to select his farm and its enterprises as to make the best 

 possible use of the labor available upon it. This is to say 

 that the work should be so diversified as to give the largest 

 possible number of working days during the year to the 

 family, hired help, teams and machinery. Idleness soon 

 eats up the profits of labor, whether it be man, beast or 

 machine that is idle. 



Selecting and planning the farm. The farm should 

 be carefully selected with reference (1) to its soil; (2) its 

 adaptability to the enterprises to be entered into, such as 

 stock raising or cropping; (3) its nearness to markets, 

 school, church and neighbors ; (4) the length of season and 

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