FARM MANAGEMENT PRACTICE OF CHESTER COUNTY, PA. 61 



tive work units with increasing size of farm is perhaps the principal 

 reason for the average increase in labor income. 



Not only does the large farm furnish a larger amount of profitable 

 labor, but it is easier for the owner to secure more efficient use of 

 labor on the larger farms. That is, he does not have to exert himself 

 so much to find profitable employment for himself and the labor 

 available to him. This is shown in the fifth column of Table 

 XXVII, under the heading " Crop acres per man." Although these 

 farms are all organized in approximately the same manner and, on 

 the whole, are conducted in much the same way, the number of 

 crop acres per man in the group of smallest farms is only 13.7, while 

 on the largest farms it is 31.1 acres, there being a general increase in 

 acres per man with increase in size of farm. On the larger farms the 

 laborers devoted a greater proportion of their time to really profit- 

 able employment. This is another reason why the large farm is 

 easier to make profitable than the small one. 



The next column of the table, headed " Man labor per crop acre," 

 shows much the same thing, though from a different viewpoint. On 

 the first group of farms — that is, the very small farms — the whole 

 amount of man labor done on the farm costs $20.74 for every acre of 

 crops grown. This includes all the labor of the farm, not merely 

 the crop labor. As the size of farm increases the amount of the total 

 farm labor per acre of crops gradually decreases until in the next 

 to the last group it amounts to only $11.80 per crop acre. In the next 

 group it is somewhat larger, these very large farms — that is, for this 

 region — perhaps being somewhat less efficiently managed than the 

 farms somewhat smaller. This column merely shows that on the 

 larger farms the labor is more efficiently applied. The next column, 

 headed " Value of labor per month per man," shows that the larger 

 the farm the more the farmer can afford to pay in wages. The 

 figures in this column are based on wages actually paid and the 

 farmer's estimate of the value of his own labor and that of the unpaid 

 members of his family. The larger farms are able to pay higher 

 wages and, at the same time, make greater profits. The next column 

 shows the crop acres per work horse. Here again we have a great 

 increase in efficiency of work horses as the size of the farm increases, 

 the number of crop acres per work horse being approximately twice 

 as great in the last group as in the first. The column headed " Work 

 horses per man " shows again that the man labor on the larger farms 

 is more efficient than it is on the smaller, the average number of work 

 horses per man increasing with the size of the farm. 



When it comes to the matter of expenses the large farms again 

 have the advantage, as shown in the column headed " Value of ma- 

 chinery per crop acre." We shall see later that the small farms are 

 not as adequately equipped with labor-saving machinery as the large 



