FARMING COMPARED 787 



requisites he receives from it. The farm is entitled to credit for the house 

 rent saved and the provisions furnished to the farmer. 



What the Farm Supplies. — The house which shelters the farmer and 

 his family is considered a part of the farm investment, and in so far as 

 the work of the farm is carried on in the house this is justifiable. On the 

 other hand, it furnishes him a home which in any other occupation would 

 have to be paid for either in the form of rent or as a separate investment. 

 The average house rent value of the farmhouse is probably worth about 

 $150 a year. 



The farm supplies much besides money. It gives food, shelter and 

 in most instances fuel. The United States Department of Agriculture 

 has recently made investigations of between 400 and 500 farm families 

 in different parts of the United States with the view of ascertaining the 

 cost of maintaining persons on farms. It was found that the cost of mam- 



A Well-planned and Neat Farmstead, 



taining a grown person averaged $176 a year. Of this sum, only about 

 twenty-two per cent was paid out in cash, the remainder being furnished 

 by the farm. 



Cost of Living on Farms. — The reduced cost of living on farms is 

 due not only to the reduced cost of what is used, but, also, too frequently, 

 to a reduced living. We often find that the farmer disposes of all the 

 best of his products, while the family uses that which cannot be sold. This 

 reduced standard of living is also manifest in the absence of such con- 

 veniences as the bathroom, running water, sewage disposal and modern 

 systems of heating and lighting. It is true that some of these items are 

 cheaper in cities than they are in the country. The individual lighting 

 system for a country house may make such lighting more expensive than 

 in the city, where the electricity or gas may be obtained from a company 

 or municipality manufacturing it on a large scale. likewise, running 



