of living for the farm family? Is family living curtailed in order 
that the farmer may advance economically? To what extent does 
size of the family affect the family living? Are cycles of family 
life — that is, periods of growth and development of the sons and 
daughters in the family — directly related to the standard of living 
provided? Does schooling of the parents bear as close a relation- 
ship to the standard of living for all members of the family as does 
the ability to pay ? To what extent is the ability to pay related to 
schooling? Is the evidence sufficient to conclude that the standard 
of living is due primarily to ability to pay, or is it due to the con- 
tinual growth of new and more wholesome desires developed 
through experience and information? 
Ordinarily the term " standard of living " conveys different ideas 
to different people. To many it means the sum total of economic 
goods meeting only the material needs of the family; that is, food, 
housing, and clothing. To others it may mean emphasis on economic 
goods satisfying the needs of a spiritual nature; such as education, 
social or personal improvement at the expense of adequate food or 
housing. The term as here used includes the goods satisfying the 
more material needs — food, housing, and clothing — as well as the 
economic goods contributing to the maintenance of health, educa- 
tion, recreation, and social relationships of the family. 
In this study the standard of living is reckoned in terms of 
money; that is, the values and the distribution of goods consumed 
annually, which values, it is believed, furnish the best available 
measure of the standard of living. In many cases market or esti- 
mated values do not represent the true market value of goods used, 
but they provide a common measure of all kinds of goods and offer 
a means of comparing goods filling one need with those filling an- 
other need. 
Cost of living and standard of living have been used interchange- 
ably in many studies of family living made in the past. With some 
studies considerable emphasis has been given to quantities and qual- 
ity of foods, clothing, and housing consumed. As yet no definite 
quantitative measures have been accepted. Measurements of quality 
of the goods used are more vague than are measurements of quantity. 
Cost of living, or " dollars worth " of goods consumed, is accepted 
as a measure in this study with the realization of its many deficien- 
cies. The dollars spent per year for food may be a poor indication 
of how well the family is nourished, because price does not corre- 
spond to nutritive value. Money spent for clothing may not always 
indicate how well the various members of the family are clad. The 
money value of the house may give little or no suggestion of the 
comforts and satisfactions which it provides as a home. These and 
other deficiencies suggest the desirability of more detailed studies of 
the adequacy of the diet, clothing, housing, and operation costs of 
the farm families. 
The method here used of summarizing and analyzing the family 
living follows as closely as possible that used in studies of the stand- 
ard of living among other groups of workers. Comparisons made 
with families of town dwellers or of industrial workers are for the 
purpose of checking the method of study rather than for the pur- 
pose of comparing the welfare of the two groups of people. Urban 
findings can not be applied to farm conditions and vice versa. The 
