May, 1925] 



FARM PRODUCTION IN CHESHIRE COUNTY 



19 



product, or receive a low wage for their labor. As a matter of fact, aver- 

 age farm incomes are low and prices are high. 



Work in mills, factories and on the road also takes a large share of the 

 surplus labor of farm residents, as shown in Figure 2. More days are 

 worked out than are hired. In only one month during hay harvest did the 

 days of farm labor hired exceed those worked out. 



There is an opportunity for outside work at fair wages in most sections 

 of the county, and this is having considerable effect on the type of farming 

 followed. Many farmers are merely living on the farm, keeping a few 

 cows and chickens and raising vegetables for home consumption; i.e., 

 they find that at slack seasons of the year working out takes the place of a 

 cash crop. Supplementary farm enterprises, therefore, do not have the 

 same advantage that they often have in more strictly agricultural com- 

 munities. 



Relative Cash Income and Expenses of Farm Residents. 



The relative importance of different farm enterprises as a source of 

 gross cash income as well as the principal cash expenses in each district 

 are shown in Table IV. Labor forms at once one of the principal cash 

 expenses and one of the major sources of income. The total income from 

 the farm operator's labor in other industries, however, is much larger than 

 the cash expenditures for hired labor. (See Table XX, Appendix.) 

 Dairying is the major farm enterprise in all districts, and feed is the largest 

 item of expense. 



Table IV. — Distribution of cash outlay and cash receipts per farm for year ending Sep'.. 30, 



1924. 



(Percentage.) 



Effect of Increasing Farm Prices. 



A larger demand for food on the part of an increasing population in the 

 United States and a comparatively stationary supplj^ of land may cause 

 a relative increase in the price of farm products. Such an increase would 

 naturally cause a more intensive cultivation of those farms in operation. 

 Where these farms were operated by owners who for various reasons were 

 slow to respond to the Ijetter opportunities, j-et did not wish to leave even 

 though their farm income was small, the full effect of economic conditions 

 would not become apparent until their farms fell into the hands of those 

 who would consider the returns from the different uses to which they 

 could place their labor and their farms. 



