4 BULLETIN 696, L T . S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
for the small quantities produced in the irrigated areas. Second 
only to those of this region are the high prices prevailing for corn in 
the Southeast and around the Gulf of Mexico. Very high price 
levels are as a rule attained near the seacoasts. 
A varying degree of increase may be noted in the upward gradua- 
tions, moving away from the described pivotal area of minimum 
price. Due eastward, throughout a large part of the corn States, 
bounded on the south by the Ohio River, prices are marked by com- 
parative uniformity and rise only slightly; but when the Eastern 
States are reached the increases become more pronounced. Toward 
the West, where regions of scant production are not far distant from 
the pivotal area, prices ascend rapidly. Likewise the increases are 
more notable in all directions other than immediately eastward 
through the corn belt. 
PRICE LEVELS AND COMMERCIAL MOVEMENT OF CORN. 
Practically the entire domestic surplus, as well as nearly all the corn 
entering into general trade channels, originates within the area of 
low prices. 
The lowest price is found in that part of the surplus-producing region 
which is at greatest expense in reaching foreign and domestic markets. 
Farm prices rise in all directions, following the course of corn from the 
territories of surplus to those of deficient production. 
The geographic trend in the price levels of wheat affords an illumi- 
nating comparison. The general level of American wheat prices is 
to a considerable degree influenced by the price received for the sur- 
plus or export wheat, which during the past 10 years constituted 
from 11 to 37 per cent of the production. Lowest prices for wheat 
are paid to farmers in the surplus-producing areas most distant from 
the important foreign and domestic markets — in the Northwest. The 
highest farm prices are found in the sections of deficient production 
which are farthest removed from the surplus-growing areas — in the 
Southeast. Prices rise in the direction of the trade currents to 
markets or territories of insufficient production; and these currents 
vary with each crop, according to the location of producing and con- 
suming region, and according to its uses, characteristics, and distribu- 
tive movement. 
In like manner the farmers' price of corn may be seen in Map 1 to 
rise steadily in a broad general relation to the trade channels from 
exporting to importing sections. Widely diffused east of the Great 
Plains (see Map 2), and becoming by far the most important 
crop in acreage and aggregate value, corn production is yet concen- 
trated within a relatively small area of dense production in the 
prairie region of the North Central section. This area comprises 
parts of nine States and forms a triangular section whose base may 
be seen in the eastern parts of Kansas, Nebraska, and South Dakota, 
