1920.] Profit and Loss Sharing in Agriculture. 2G1 



employees the farm still showed losses, is it not true 

 to say tliat the employees had given " something 

 for nothing," i.e., that they had shared in the losses ? 

 They had worked harder than they had any need to, 

 and for this extra effort they had received nothing. 

 (/) Lastty, it must be pointed out that the relatively high 

 profits shown during the war years were partly due 

 to the reahsation of the capital in the soil by cross- 

 cropping and so on. Hence, had a scheme of profit 

 and loss sharing been in operation, the farmer would 

 have been justified in placing a certain amount 

 to a Special Reserve Account towards the time 

 when this capital had to be put back into the soil. 

 1 1 . Conclusion. — It is not possible nor desirable in an article 

 such as this to go into details of the actual book-keeping entries 

 which would be necessary to give effect to the above proposals 

 and results. Suffice it to say that this is a comparatively 

 simple matter, and, as already indicated, would be subject to 

 the scrutiny of a qualified auditor. It only remains to mention 

 that suitable steps should be taken to ascertain the views of 

 the employees before any decisions are arrived at, either by 

 meeting the employees as a body or, preferably, by meeting 

 a small committee appointed by themselves. Given confidence 

 between " master and man," there is every reason why a 

 scheme of profit and loss sharing should succeed ; without this 

 confidence it is almost certain to fail. 



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