THE LEVEL AND COST OF LIVING 



183 



been calculated at a little less than $4,000. Thus 

 real property amounts to a little less than $25,- 

 000 — about $158 per family and about $31 per 

 capita. There is little profit in trying to calculate 

 the value of community (public) property such as 

 the church and public buildings and grounds, the 

 roads, etc. These assets, not only solidly frozen 

 but also not potentially usable by individuals, 

 have only academic interest. Eight hundred 

 dollars has been calculated to be the value of 

 domestic animals owned, and $3,000 that of 

 household goods and tools. The annual cost of 

 clothing is $3,900, but the value of the clothing in 

 the possession of the Indians at any point in time 

 is probably closer to $3,500. To the resulting 

 sum of $32,300 might be added, as part of the 

 wealth of the community: 



(1) The value at a point in time, or the average 

 during the year, of crops standing in Indian fields 

 and stored ready for sale. The value of standing 

 coffee has already been partly included. Other 

 produce on hand varies greatly with the season. 

 Except in the cases of garlic and onion seed, they 

 are very quickly tm-ned into money. It seems 

 more useful to treat this wealth as income balanced 

 by expenditures rather than as a capital asset. 



(2) The value of food and supplies on hand in 

 the various kitchens of the community. Except 

 in the case of corn in the months after the harvest, 

 the Indians normallj' have only a few day's' supply 

 of food, and of many items even less. In both 

 cases, the turnover in the course of a year is com- 

 plete, and again such assets are treated only as 

 items of expenditure. 



(3) The amount of cash on hand. It differs 

 with the season, but not as much as it would in a 

 community where a cash crop is harvested at once. 

 Corn, garlic, onion seed, and pepinos are harvested 

 at particular times; but the much more miportant 

 onions are harvested throughout the year, and 

 various fruits ripen at different times. Most 

 Indians balance expenditures against receipts with 

 a short interval of time, and cash on hand is both 

 a small and a temporary item. Sizable surpluses 

 of cash can exist only in the case of very few 

 families. A few wealthy families are known to 

 have considerable cash on hand, kept in chests at 

 home (banks are not used); in two or three cases 

 it might amount, at times, to hundreds of dollars. 

 But the rich seem generally to invest their funds 

 in land, and are rich rather in the value of property 



owned than in cash. I would be surprised to find 

 more than $5,000 in loose cash in the community 

 at any one time, including that which represents 

 a lag between selling and buying, or more than 

 about $2,000 in real savings. 



Unless one includes the special knowledge of 

 artisans and professionals, there are almost no 

 intangible economic assets. The shamans occa- 

 sionally teach others for a consideration; literacy 

 is a recognized economic advantage — at least in 

 the negative sense of making flagrant cheating by 

 means of false receipts less likely — and persons 

 who can write receive gifts when they assist others. 

 The labor of persons with reputations for industry 

 and skill in agriculture is in demand and perhaps 

 commands better prices; but there is nothing 

 formalized about this. Finally, there is a manu- 

 script of the "conquest" dance owned by a local 

 Indian, and he was at least once asked to teach 

 the dance (for a consideration) in another town. 



THE BALANCE OF PAYMENTS 



The wealth and well-being of the community is 

 better measured in its annual receipts and expendi- 

 tures. Transactions within the community I shaU 

 not attempt to estimate. Most such transactions 

 represent labor (for cash) which Indians do for 

 one another. In contrast, there is very little 

 commerce within the community, principally 

 because most of the people produce about the 

 same things. Merchants buy produce less from 

 their neighbors than in the public market, where 

 it is pooled and where its source in relation to its 

 destination is difScult to analyze. 



Table 74 summarizes the transactions between 

 the Panajachel Indian community and the outside, 

 comparing expenditures and receipts to strike 

 what might be called the balance of payments. 

 The total community expenditures outside the 

 community ($19,544.18) come to $127 per family 

 or $25 per person, receipts ($21,530.91) to $139 

 per family or $27.60 per person. The difference of 

 over $2,000 between the two totals is such that 

 each family, on the average, gains $12 a year in 

 money or in what money will buy. Since there 

 seems to be no possibility that this is either a paper 

 balance, or represented by increased gold stocks, 

 or anything of the sort, the wealth of the com- 

 munity and its standard of living would seem to be 

 rising. The calculated balance of $2,000, although 

 the result of countless smaller calculations of 



