4 BULLETIN 1351, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
Spring wheat; January, 1897, to January, 1898, No. 2 wheat; 
January, 1898, to March, 1903, regular No. 2; March, 1903, to 
June, 1922, No. 2 Red wheat. 
That the Chicago price is representative of prices for the United 
States as a whole is shown by the fact that correlation coefficients of 
+ 0.98 for oats and of +0.99 for wheat are obtained when Chicago 
prices are correlated with the December farm prices as estimated by 
the Department of Agriculture. 
The period covered in the major part of the study is that from 1896 
to 1922, omitting the years 1916, 1917,. 1918, 1919, and 1920. The 
omission of these years was considered necessary for accurate results, 
since the abnormal conditions of demand and abnormal changes in 
the price level during this period would tend to obscure the effect of 
forces that under normal conditions would be operative in the oats 
market. 
An examination of exports of oats during the war period as com- 
pared with years before and after the war will show the extent to 
which the export demand was abnormal during the period omitted 
in this study. 
Table 1. — Exports of oats from the United States, years ending June SO 1 
»- 
Year 
Quantity 
Av. 1910-1914 
Bushels 
\ 304, 000 
Av. 1915-1919 _ .. . . -.-... ... ..... ... 
06, 774, 000 
1920-.- 
33, 945, 000 
1921- 
4, 302, 000 
i U. S. Dept. Agr., Yearbook, 1921, p. 74. 
FACTORS AFFECTING ANNUAL PRICE OF OATS 
PRODUCTION AND THE AREA OF THE OAT MARKET 
A study of the production of oats in the United States shows that 
for 30 years or more preceding the World War the trend of produc- 
tion has been steadily upward, reaching its peak in 1917 with a pro- 
duction of 1,593 million bushels. Since 1917 the production has 
slightly declined, the 1923 figure being 1,300 million bushels. Prac- 
tically all of the oats produced in this country are consumed here. In 
the pre-war period, 1909 to 1913, the exports of oats from the United 
States averaged not quite 1 per cent of the crop, and imports were 
less. 2 During the war an abnormal foreign demand increased our 
exports, but since the war they have returned to their former low 
figures. 
Figure 1 represents graphically the production of oats during the 
period 1881-1922. Superimposed upon the graph of production is 
a straight fine representing the trend of production during that 
period. 3 
These figures regarding production, imports, and exports indicate 
at once that in spite of the enormous production of oats in this 
country the market area is limited to the United States, a fact which 
is of considerable importance in the selection of methods for the 
study of prices. 
3 U. S. Dept. Agr., Yearbook, 1921, p. 781, 551. 
3 The method of calculating this trend is explained in Table I, Appendix A, p. 27. 
