FUNCTIONS OF WEALTH 



193 



three top groups — land pawned out was worth less 

 than that taken in, so the fact that they were 

 debtor households is hidden in the table. There- 

 fore the number of households with land pawned 

 was really as follows: 



Poorest quarter 



Medium-poor quarter 11 



Medium-rich quarter 6 



Richest quarter 14 



As one ascends the scale, the average value of the 

 land given in pawn increases in each group, from 

 $48 in the first to $63 to $98, presumably because 

 there is increasingly more land to pawn. 



In the same way, the number of households who 

 controlled land on pawn in 1936 may be summar- 

 ized as 



Poorest quarter 5 



Medium-poor quarter 5 



Medium-rich quarter 6 



Richest quarter 8 



with the average value of the land $26, $18, $55, 

 and $146 in the four groups respectively. With- 

 out one extraordinary household, the average 

 value in the last group would be but $58. 



It would appear that the poorest people who 

 yet own a little land are becoming richer; that the 

 medium-poor are going down rather than up ; that 

 there is considerable shifting of positions in the 

 medium-rich group, so that as many are becoming 

 richer as poorer; and that the richest families are 

 tending to become poorer. It will also be noticed 

 that most changes in amounts of land controlled 

 are small, the families changing their relative posi- 

 tions but little. However one family (No. 69) 

 dropped from the middle down to the very bottom 

 of the landed families. Actually, in this case the 

 household has since disintegrated — the widowed 

 mother having died and her sons having left town 

 to seek work. Another (No. 30) dropped from a 

 medium-rich position to among the poorest; this 

 famOy is well-known for having frittered away its 

 inheritance. A similar case is that of No. 27; 

 there is a story told that when his parents died, 

 the boy who is now head of this household burned 

 his heritage of paper money, thinking it was just 

 paper. The down-sledding of the last extreme 

 case (No. 5) began (I was told by a principal in 

 the story) when the family lost the services of a 

 debtor-relative whose labor had helped make it 

 wealthy. Sickness and death were also involved, 



and since 1936 the family has lost much more land. 

 Extreme cases of improvement of position are not 

 to be found. 



Table 77 shows that most renters are in the 

 middle economic groups. In the lowest quarter 

 there are 11 renters, in the second, 13, in the third, 

 18, and in the highest only 6. If the rentals of 

 bean land are omitted, the figures are 9, 13, 16, 

 and 5, and the value of land rented is $336, $471, 

 $753, and $164 respectively in the 4 groups. 

 Apparently renting increases with land owned up 

 to a certain point; but large landholders do not 



Table 77. — Wealth of households renting agricultural land 



' The land ns rented is not really worth this much because it is rented only 

 for the growing of beans; but I have assigned it truck -land value. 

 ' Land used without payment by permission of employer-owner. 



