CATTLE PRICES AND THE RATIO 

 METHOD 



A RATIO between corn and cattle does not represent cost of 

 production nearly as accurately as a ratio between corn and 

 hogs. However, such a ratio, when worked out and applied over 

 a long period of years, reveals the interesting historical fact that 

 the swings in cattle prices above and below the ratio line are periods 

 of about seven years each way. 



A more accurate method is to take into account the fact that 

 fat cattle as produced in the corn belt and marketed at Chicago 

 are commonly made out of feeders which were bought a few months 

 previously, taken to the farm, and finished chiefly on corn, together 

 with a little in the way of pasture, hay, silage and concentrated 

 feeds, such as cottonseed meal and oil meal. 



As an average of the ten-year period, 1906-1915, ordinary 

 1,000-pound feeders on Chicago, in October, cost $51.20. As an 

 average of the ten-year period, these same 1,000-pound feeders, as 

 ordinar}-, well-finished fat steers weighing 1,300 povnids each, sold 

 the following April for $98.35. During this ten-year period it 

 seemed to take $4-7.15 to cover the cost of feed, risk, labor, etc., 

 of bringing a 1,000-pcund feeder to l,SOO-pound fat condition. 

 Ordinarily, it is substantially accurate to measure these things 

 in terms of corn only. During the tcn-3^ear period under consid- 

 eration, the weighted price of corn was 61.5 cents. Dividing 

 $47.15 by 61.5 cents equals 76.7 bushels. As an average of the 

 ten-year period it has required the value of 76.7 bushels of weighted 

 corn to make a 1,000-pound feeder, bought in October, moderately 

 fat for the Chicago market the following April. The com is 

 weighted on the theory that the steers consume 8 per cent of it the 

 month after they arc bought, 15 per cent the second month, 20 per 

 cent the third month, 20 per cent the fourth, 20 per cent the fifth, 

 and 17 per cent the last month. Applying the ten-year ratio to 

 the specific month of April, 1918, we find that a 1,000-pound 

 feeder in October, 1917, cost $84-, and the value of 76.7 bushels of 

 composite corn was $139.40, making a total cost of the finished 

 1,300-pound steer, $223.40. The actual selling price in the month 

 of April, 1918, was $199.55, or a loss of about $23.85 per steer. 

 Applying the same method month by month, we get the chart as 

 herewith published. It expresses profits and losses with a fair 

 degree of accuracy to the ordinary cattleman who buys feeders 



