THE MOVEMENT OF WHEAT-GROWING 343 



the price of the land in turn helps to determine the kind of farming 

 that is most profitable from the standpoint of the individual farmer. 

 To the individual farmer wheat is an unprofitable crop in the 

 southeastern counties of Minnesota because the land is too high. 

 From the standpoint of society at large it may be said that the land 

 is too high because other crops are more profitable than wheat. It 

 is the individual farmer, however, who has to choose between the 

 extensive or more intensive modes of farming, and whose decision 

 has determined the movement of the wheat industry. We must 

 look at the question from his standpoint, therefore, if we are to 

 appreciate the cause of the movement. The reason why a man 

 adopting the more intensive modes of farming can crowd out the 

 wheat-farmer is that the former can pay a higher price for the land 

 than the latter, because he can grow a more valuable crop than 

 wheat. On the other hand, the reason why the wheat farmer under 

 such conditions moves to the cheaper lands is that the added 

 expense from increased rent on the high-priced land leaves a 

 smaller net return to him than could be realized if the land were 

 cultivated more intensively, while at the same time larger net 

 returns will accrue by taking up cheaper lands. 



This cause of the shifting of wheat-farming as applied to the 

 state of Minnesota accounts for the movement of the wheat belt 

 from east to west across the continent. In a general way the 

 wheat belt of thirty years ago has the same advantages over the 

 West that the southeastern counties of Minnesota have over 

 those of the Red River valley. There are, however, two other 

 conditions that have given the West a relative advantage over the 

 East for purposes of wheat culture. Some of the eastern lands 

 had through long usage been deprived of some of their fertility. 

 This, however, had not been carried far enough to affect materi- 

 ally the movement of the wheat industry. More important than 

 this is the fact that eastern farms were planned for the early 

 kind of wheat-farming, before binders and reapers had affected 

 the economy of wheat production. The farms were therefore so 

 small in size that the individual farmer with his limited number 

 of acres could not utilize the later improved machinery to its full 

 capacity. The force of this will be more fully appreciated when 



