FARM-MANAGEMENT SURVEY OF REPRESENTATIVE AREAS. 11 
INCOMES RECEIVED BY FARM TENANTS. 
There are few regions in the United States where tenant farming 
has been developed so extensively and where it plays such an impor- 
tant part in agricultural production as in the corn belt. The per- 
‘centage of farms worked by tenants is second only to those operated 
by owners, and the areas farmed and the products grown compare 
very favorably with those of the farm owners. 
In the region covered by this survey, records were secured from 247 
tenant farmers. These men rented one farm, or land owned by one 
person. There were 51 other tenants who rented farms from two 
different parties. Their records show the same results, which have 
not been included in Table IV. 
Taste 1V.—Average capital, receipts, expenses, and profits of tenants on 247 
farms operated by tenants in Indiana, Illinois, and Towa. 
Indiana | Illinois Towa Average 
Item. (83 (71 (93 (247 
farms). | farms). | farms). | farms). 
= 
PAW CTACChATC Ayer merece aes e Nori SOLS trcie clos a aids steels ote acres. . 128 202 187 Lia 
PAST CLA OCA DIA nee nek ore rel Non eee Ae ete DLS LS eho Roe $1, 758 $2, 867 $2, 667 $2, 431 
ASYOPARS WACO IOUS 5 S Scobie as eI OE Soe Rae Sn 1,335 2,257 1, 605 1, 732 
FARV CLAD CIE XEN SCS mary erm weae ae See OEE See eee se eu 492 975 755 740 
AC CLAP OM ann Un COMIC. Statist ue Ie eT eC ee cae Daal 843 1, 282 850 992 
AW era cenmmlerestiat open Cemt oe. 222. 5.264). ee es 88 143 134 122 
Average tenant’s labor income ..-.....-......--...---- By PE 755 1,139 716 870 
Most tenants hope to become farm owners as soon as they have 
sufficient capital. The income they receive while leasing a farm is a 
measure of the period they will have to work before making the 
change. The average tenant in Indiana, with an investment of 
$1,758, received $755 for his year’s work. In Illinois, with an invest- 
ment of $2,867, he received $1,139 as a labor income. In Iowa, with 
an average capital of $2,667, his labor income was $716. Owing to 
drought in early summer, the income of the tenant in Iowa was prob- 
ably 20 per cent less than it would have been in a normal crop year. 
The 247 tenant farmers made an average labor income of $870 
from an investment of less than $2,500. When it is remembered that 
the farm owners with over 12 times this investment made less than 
half the labor income of the tenants, the evidence is unmistakable 
that the man with small capital should rent rather than buy a farm. 
For the amount invested, the tenant’s income is very much greater 
than that of the farm owner. The sum available for the family liv- 
ing, however, 1s smaller in the case of the tenant, for the farm owner, 
with an average capital of $30,606 (see Table IT), has $1,530 interest 
to use, as well as the $408 labor income. Thus, if the farm owner 
is free of debt, as one-half of them are, he has $1,938 available for 
a living, as compared with the tenant’s $992. 
