34 COMMISSIONOF CONSERVATION 



being 339,047,840 in 1910, compared with $29,731,922 in 1900. 

 The increase was partly due to advanced prices but to a greater extent 

 to increased production. 



That there have been periods during which production has been 

 stationary, and has even fallen off in parts of the country, that there 

 have been good lands abandoned or left unused, and that rural deter- 

 ioration has taken place, only indicate that there are certain causes at 

 work which prevent us from obtaining the full measure of prosperity 

 which should come to the country. That we do not receive that full 

 measure, even with our available population and capital, is due to the 

 fact that the human activity and human skill which we possess is not 

 being applied to the best advantage in the conversion of our natural 

 resources to human use. 



As an agricultural authority has said, the profits of farming are 

 probably greater than the average farmer thinks they are and less 

 than the city dweller believes them to be. It seems to be taken for 

 granted and is probably true that the earnings of the farmer are less 

 than the earnings in other fields of labour. No accurate figures 

 are available to enable an estimate to be made with regard to farm 

 incomes in Canada, but some information has been collected on this 

 subject in the United States. 



Professor G. F. Warren, of Cornell University, found, after 

 investigation, that in the best townships in Jefferson county the farmer 

 and his family, with an average capital of $9,006, made $1,155 

 above the business expenses of the farm. In addition, they had the 

 use of a house and some farm products. At 5 per cent the use of 

 the capital is worth $450, and unpaid farm work done by members 

 of the family was valued at $96, so that the pay for the farmer's 

 work or his labour income was $609, besides the use of a house and 

 some farm products. He says this is considerably above the aver- 

 age for the States, a statement which is confirmed by Professor W. 

 J. Spillman, of the United States Department of Agriculture. In 

 an article* on the farmer's income the latter gives $640 as the aver- 

 age income obtained in the United States after deducting total ex- 

 penses from the total receipts. He estimates that at 5 per cent as 

 the rate of interest this should be distributed between interest and 

 labour income, as follows: 



Interest on investment _ $322 



Labour income.. 318 



Another United States authority shows that the average income 

 of 2,090 farmers operating their own farms in eight States was $439. 



"The Farmer's Income", in Selected Readings in Rural Economics. 



