THE AFTER-WAR DEPRESSION 48 



prices again rise considerably above the pre- 

 war normal or other prices come down. 



It has been stated and believed by many that 

 the American farmer brought on his own 

 destruction by overproduction following the 

 war. There was a continuation of a campaign 

 to boost food production long after the war was 

 over under the pretext of helping to revive the 

 starved people of Europe. Production was 

 stimulated artificially to a considerable degree. 

 Yet the total production of grain was only 

 slightly larger in 1920 than the average of 1909 

 to 1913, while the production of cotton was rela- 

 tively less. The number of cattle and sheep on 

 farms in 1920 was less than pre-war five-year 

 period, although the number of hogs was some- 

 what greater. The slaughter of cattle and sheep 

 was below the pre-war average. 



The public w^s largely led to wrong con- 

 clusions by the greatly increased dollar value 

 of crops produced, estimated on the basis of 

 prices of 1919 and early 1920, rather than the 

 production figures. This emphasizes a fact 

 which has been the cause of much misunder- 

 standing of the farm situation, namely the re- 

 garding of the dollar value of a crop as the 

 true measure of its size and as a measure of 



