26 BULLETIN 1261, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
causing a necessary additional expense. The plan of the packing 
house and the equipment used affect the efficiency with which labor 
can be employed, and may materially influence labor expense. 
Satisfactory, well-arranged equipment and a well-planned plant 
do not necessarily mean an excessive investment. Many smaU 
associations are well above the average in this respect. More atten- 
tion has been given to planning the packing house and the layout 
of equipment in recent years than formerly. 
Reference to Table 6 will show the relative importance of the 
various labor operations. Packing oranges cost, on the average, 
5.5 cents per box for the period 1917-1921. This is piecework, for 
the most part, and the cost is not so susceptible to control bv the 
management as are other operations. All other packing-house labor 
for oranges cost, as an average of the associations studied, 7 cents 
per box for the seasons ending 1917 to 1921, inclusive. The largest 
item is " grading and tallying," which cost 2.1 cents per box. It is 
in these miscellaneous operations that savings in labor costs can 
generally be made. 
Labor employed in packing lemons, as an average of the associa- 
tions studied for the 5 7 year period, cost 11.2 cents, and all packing- 
house labor 36 cents per box. In the operations usually performed 
by day labor, there are two large items, " receiving, washing, and 
storing," 7.9 cents per box, and "grading and tallying," 13 cents per 
box. The total cost of the operations, usually performed by day 
labor, excluding car loading and packing, is 24.1 cents per box. As 
might be expected, labor costs of the lemon associations show wider 
variations than those of associations handling oranges. 
Table 8 shows the variation in labor costs of associations handling 
lemons only and those handling oranges only. The variations in 
the houses handling both oranges and lemons are similar for each 
kind of fruit, but costs in the "mixed" houses can not be compared 
so definitely with the total volume of business and for that reason 
they have been omitted from the chart (fig. 7.) The chart shows 
clearly that labor economy is not correlated with volume of business. 
Orange association No. 13 maintained an average labor cost of a 
little less than 10 cents per box as an average for the three years; 
it cost four associations (Nos. 2, 3, 6, and 10), handling a greater 
volume of business, approximately 14 cents per box for packing-house 
labor, as an average for the same period, or 4 cents more than asso- 
ciation No. 13. 
The data at hand do not explain the reason for the lower labor 
costs of association No. 13. However, if association No. 2, for ex- 
ample, could have obtained the same labor economy, it would have 
returned to its members over $15,500 additional each year, for the 
three years represented, or the four associations mentioned would 
have made a total annual saving of over $50,000. 
The labor costs of lemon houses show even greater opportunity 
for economy. The smallest association represented, No. 12, shows 
an average cost for packing-house labor of 39.6 cents per box for the 
three-year period. It costs association No. 6, 13.3 cents per box 
more, or 52.9 cents per box, as an average for the same period. 
If this association could have reduced labor expense to the same 
level as No. 12, its annual saving would have been over $17,600 for 
the three-year period. 
