VALUE AND PRICE AS RELATED TO FARM PRODUCTS 37 



persons found guilty of such practices punished/' etc. Do you believe 

 that the first of these propositions is borne out by the facts of war 

 prices in the United States ? Do you think the Taxpayers' Club had 

 adequate information upon which to base its action? Upon what 

 data do you base your own conclusion ? 



2. Do you agree with the second proposition of the foregoing pre- 

 amble ? Just what practices should be stopped ? By what means ? 

 Upon what grounds would judicial or executive officers decide when 

 a price was natural and right and when it was artificial and wicked ? 

 Is the situation analogous to public utility rate-making ? Should we 

 look forward to government regulation of food prices after the war ? 

 Would regulation of methods be better than regulation of prices ? 



3. "The doctor goes out to see a patient and he knows what he 

 is going to get for that service. The lawyer knows what he is going to 

 get for trying a case. The banker fixes his rate of interest. The bus- 

 iness man figures up his expenses and adds in the per cent that he 

 wants for his profit. He knows what he is going to get. Everybody, 

 with the exception of the farmer, has some way to protect himself on 

 his investment. If we raise a bushel of corn that costs us fifty cents, we 

 don't know that we are going to get a fair remunerative price for our 

 labor and our product. If we raise one dollar's worth of stuff, we 

 should get one dollar for it and a legitimate profit over and above 

 that." Is the first part of this a correct statement of facts ? Is the 

 latter part sound economic philosophy? What is "a dollar's worth 

 of stuff" ? Could the world be run on a plan of guaranteeing every 

 man his costs of production ? 



4. Can farmers control the price situation through the increase or 

 decrease of production as flexibly as can the manufacturer ? To what 

 extent can they exert such control ? Upon what consideration is the 

 acreage in a given crop determined today? Would a rational eco- 

 nomic basis of determining such acreage be possible? Would a 

 rather large " factor of safety" be necessary? Why? Examine the 

 figures for acreage and price of farm products as given in the Yearbook 

 of the United States Department of Agriculture to see whether it 

 seems that farmers govern their operations in such a way as to get 

 the benefit of accurately meeting market needs. The figures for 

 potatoes are perhaps the best to study. The accompanying chart 

 (Fig. 1) shows them graphically. Does the acreage of a given year 

 appear to be controlled by the price of the preceding year i.e., the 

 acreage being reduced after a low price and increased after a high 

 price ? Is this change of such an amount as to effect a readjustment 

 and balance or to throw matters out of balance in the opposite direc- 

 tion? Is the situation more or less extreme in the case of crops 

 which take many years to come to bearing, such as fruit trees ? 



