FUTURE DEMAND FOR TIMBER 



411 



and are also not likely to change. School furniture 

 has shown a tendency to swing toward metal, but 

 wood stUl holds a substantial share of the market. 



In the professional-furniture field, wood has a 

 weak position — ^except with regard to laboratory 

 cabinets and cases where its noncorroding charac- 

 teristics are an asset. For nonhousehold furniture 

 as a whole, lumber use in 1954 amounted to 0.26 

 board-foot per dollar of shipments; in 1952 the 

 ratio was probably about the same. In view of 

 the trends discussed above there is little reason 

 to expect any drastic reduction. Lumber use per 

 dollar of shipments may be about 0.24 board -foot 

 by 1975 and about 0.22 board-foot by 2000. By 

 applying these factors to the values of nonhouse- 

 hold furniture shipments, estimates of future 

 lumber use are obtained. 



The estimated 1952 lumber consumption in 

 manufacture of all types of furniture and expected 

 use in 1975 and 2000 — assuming no change in the 

 real price of lumber — are summarized as follows: 



Million board-feet 



Household Nonhousehold All 

 furniture furniture furniture 



1952 1,780 134 1,914 



1975 .. 2,440 210 2,650 



9nf,n /3, 010 300 3,310 



^wu \3,650 390 4,040 



The increase during the period 1952-75 would 

 amount to 38 percent. During the period 1952- 

 2000 it would amount to 73 percent or to 111 

 percent — depending on whether population is 

 then near 275 million or in the vicinity of 360 

 million. 



Many Other Manufactured Products 

 Require Lumber 



Manufacture of the various nonfurniture prod- 

 ucts absorbed 1,946 million board-feet of lumber 

 in 1948. Product-by-product analyses of future 

 demand for such a long list of items — and of the 

 volume of lumber that may be demanded in 

 manufacture of each, is not practicable. Instead, 

 the products are grouped according to whether 

 demand for them is likely to follow (a) the trend 

 of population growth, (b) trend in number of 

 households, (c) trend of disposable personal in- 

 come, or (d) trend of farm output. After group- 

 ing in each of these four categories, there is stUl a 

 miscellaneous collection of products that do not 

 appear to fit very well in any of the four categories. 



The output of boot and shoe findings (last 

 blocks and the like, used in shoe manufacture) 

 depends on the demand for shoes — determined 

 largely by number of people and upon the rate 

 of footwear replacement. As lower-bracket family 

 incomes rise, people tend to own more shoes and 

 to replace their shoes more rapidly. Demand 



for shoe-manufacturing equipment may there- 

 fore increase somewhat faster than growth of 

 population. 



The output of caskets, on the other hand, 

 depends on the number of deaths. So long as 

 population continues to increase, the number of 

 deaths will necessarily increase less than growth 

 of population. 



Consumption of matches is determined largely 

 by the number of people who smoke. It appears 

 rather doubtful that per capita consumption of 

 matches in the future will be any larger than at 

 present. Demand for matches is therefore likely 

 to increase in direct proportion to population. 

 This same proposition may hold with regard to 

 demand for pencils and penholders. 



While not many households use more than one 

 refrigerator, this is one item of equipment stUl 

 lacking in many dwellings — particularly in rural 

 areas. As disposable personal income rises, output 

 of refrigerators can be expected to increase some- 

 what faster than number of households. This 

 same proposition may hold with respect to laundry 

 appliances, Venetian blinds, and plumbers' wood- 

 work. 



Some of the products under consideration are 

 luxury or semiluxury items. Demand for such 

 goods will probably increase at about the same 

 rate as disposable personal income. The products 

 in this category include: sports equipment, toys, 

 musical instruments, radios (including television 

 sets and record players), house trailers, wooden- 

 ware, and novelties. It is probable that demand 

 for fixtures, and for signs, scenery, and displays 

 will also follow the disposable-income trend. AU 

 are used in the selling of merchandise, and vol- 

 ume of such trade is determined largely by con- 

 sumer income. 



Demand for agricultural implements is ex- 

 pected to parallel the trend of farm output; the 

 relationship is direct but subject to trends in 

 mechanization of agriculture and to farmers' 

 income. Recognition of these subsidiary factors, 

 however, is hardly necessary for present purposes. 



The remaining assortment of products (ladders, 

 handles, electrical equipment, small boats and 

 ships, patterns and flasks, and machinery) does 

 not appear to belong in any of the categories 

 discussed above. Future output for such products 

 is estimated strictly on a judgment basis. 



In accordance with the reasoning reviewed 

 above, 1952 consumption and increases in demand 

 by 1975 and 2000 are estimated for various 

 products (table 240). Wliile the results are ad- 

 mittedly rough, errors in judgment probably 

 tend to compensate. Applying these estimated 

 increases in product consumption to the quantity 

 of lumber consumed in the 1948 manufacture of 

 each product, lumber consumption of 2,150 

 million board-feet is indicated for 1952 and 3,400 

 million board-feet by 1975. The comparable 



