FARM OWNERSHIP AND TENANCY IX TEXAS. 43 
selves longest. In other words, figuratively speaking, the operators 
of greatest capacity and efficiency (which undoubtedly are the main 
determinants of largest accumulating power) crowd upper strata of 
the tenant stages and soon pass off into the owner stage. On the 
other hand, the poorest accumulators of the owner and share-tenant 
stages suffer reverses and settle toward lower stages, out of which 
some never rise. 
Among owners, however, the majority of best accumulators have 
worked for themselves longest — the reverse of the situation with the 
tenant classes. Many operators become owners through fortuitous 
assistance and often can remain in the stage throughout life, even 
though suffering a small annual loss. Nevertheless, reversals from 
this stage (there were 42 tenants out of the 258 who had at one time 
been owners) largely involve incompetent operators, many of whom 
can provide for their families best in a state of tenancy, where they 
are supervised by more competent operators. 
These two functions of the different tenure stages are based on the 
fundamental fact that men vary greatly in ability to produce and 
accumulate, which fact must not be neglected in shaping any land 
policy. It is highly important that the road to advanced stages be 
kept open and free from uneconomic handicaps, such as speculative 
land values : that care be taken that the operators in the lower stages 
get a return commensurate to their efforts and ability ; that they have 
proper houses to live in; that they be given a chance to expand as 
they prove their ability; and that they have contracts protecting 
them in their rights and protecting the landlord from any dishonesty 
on the part of unscrupulous renters. 
CLASSIFICATION OF OPERATORS ACCORDING TO ABILITY TO ACCUMULATE WEALTH. 
The reasons why men differ in their ability to accumulate wealth 
are numerous. In fact, each case probably has its own set of reasons 
that are somewhat different from all others. Nevertheless, there are 
some general conditions associated with the rate of accumulation 
which can well be brought out by way of comparison. 39 
A glance at Figure 5, in the light of what has. been said on the dual 
function of the tenure stages, will show that a tenure classification 
within itself is a rough classification of operators into classes of 
accumulators. However, within each tenure class there are good as 
well as poor accumulators; therefore operators within each tenure 
class were divided into the best, the medium, and the poorest accumu- 
■ 38 The factors that enter into the individual operator's ability to accumulate wealth 
from his earnings are as follows : (1) Ability to produce, which depends on the operator's 
capacity and efficiency; (2) ability to save wealth produced; and (3) ability to use saved 
wealth in the production of more wealth. 
