"Che RURAL NEW-YORKER 
1261 
Profiteering in Milk 
Cutting Down Consumption. —Why 
do not consumers organize for a protest 
against high retail prices for milk? So 
far they seem to think the only way to 
help themselves is to use less milk. In¬ 
stead, they should use more freely of this 
best of foods for young and old. To cut 
down on milk creates a surplus and dis¬ 
courages the dairy industry, which has 
struggled along against heavy «dds for 
many years. To use less milk only makes 
milk cost the more in the end, as dairy¬ 
men in many localities are being obliged 
to sell off their herds for beef, because 
there is no profit in producing milk. With 
present management of retail milk it is 
bound to become higher and scarcer, 
alarmingly so. 
Low Prices. —It is only recently that 
farmers have, through their Dairymen’s 
League, had a voice in setting their own 
milk prices, these being but little if any 
above the cost of production. I remember 
when we sold milk for years around 60 
cents per 100 pounds, and the rapacious 
milk dealers set the starvation prices for 
the farmers, who would have sacrificed 
their dairies but that they had to con¬ 
sider maintaining the fertility of their 
farms, depending on small side lines for 
support. Surely farmers should receive 
a profit for their long, hard hours of heavy 
labor. 
An Unfair Attitude. —As a sample of 
the unfair attitude the _ dealers adopt 
toward farmers I can think of nothing 
more really unheard-of than the one they 
took in passing upon the various items of 
expense in producing milk, as figured by 
Dr. "Warren, the farm management spe¬ 
cialist of the State College of Agriculture 
at Cornell T’niversity. They could not 
ob.iect to any other item of expense as 
listed by him. but they said they objected 
to paying dairymen 33 cents an hour for 
the labor necessary to produce milk, and 
their reason was surely unique -—that 
farmers worked so many hours per day. 
If dairymen, they said, worked but eight 
to 10 hours a day, as did other laborers, 
they could command this wage, but as 
they work .12 to 16 hours per day they 
should charge less per hour! They did 
not pretend to say that Dr. Warren’s^ es¬ 
timate of the number of hours required 
per 100 pounds of milk was overdrawn, 
but they did not want the farmer to be 
paid for his skilled work over 25 cents 
an hour, the price that any inexperienced 
high school girl or boy can go out upon 
the farm and command, with board free 
thrown in. 
A Lack of Understanding. —If the 
shipbuilders of this country worked as long 
and faithfully every day as do the dairy¬ 
men, the shipping of our country would 
be better cared for than it is. And if 
they did put in 12 to 16 hours a day at 
their difficult, skilled work, I would like 
to see the man who would dare to insist 
that they be paid less per hour because 
they worked overtime! The American 
public is notably fair and just in most 
things, but the people do not seem to give 
the farmer the fair deal they are willing 
to give to others. This is really because 
they do not understand the farmer’s con¬ 
ditions or what he is really doing. 
The Real Profiteers. —City people 
in general do not understand that it is the 
milk dealers and distributors who are the 
profiteers, as the latters blame it on the 
farmers in every public way possible, in 
the daily press, and all sorts of meetings 
before officials who know little or nothing 
of farm conditions, but who have pow'er 
to fir prices. The farmer is busy at 
home; does not watch for opportunities 
to tell his story where it will count for 
ju.stice and right, and only the other side 
is heard. 
The Farmers Score. —Only the other 
day at a conference of the mayors of this 
State, w'ith State and Federal food com¬ 
missions, the farmers would not have had 
a person present who knew real conditions 
had not a live Pomona Grange from a 
nearby dairy county sent their Farm Bu¬ 
reau manager to look out for the farmers’ 
interests. The State milk dealers were 
well represented, as were the State milk 
retailers’ organization, and their hard 
luck story had w’on the ear and heart of 
the officials present. The Farm Bureau 
man told of real facts of milk profiteering 
in his own city in the heart of a dairy 
section, profits running from close to 
200 per cent in June to 89 per cent at the 
present time. The result was a changed 
sentiment on the part of the officials, a 
drastic but unanimous resolution against 
retail milk profiteering, and a note in the 
daily papers next day that “the farmers 
had scored a point!” 
Excessive Profits. —Public opinion in 
this same dairy county is being rapidly 
molded against present highwaymen meth¬ 
ods of the milk peddlers. In this same 
city at a recent gathering of the Chamber 
of Commerce and the retailers of the city 
a hot discussion wms entered into when 
the former demanded that the latter ex¬ 
plain their position. The retailers had 
said there was no reason why they should 
lower their prices, as the consumers had 
not complained, and that they must make 
these exorbitant profits in warm weather, 
as they could not in cold weather. In 
October, however, they raised their price, 
instead of holding it where it was. and 
the consumers did raise a storm of pro¬ 
test. as the Grange had been informing 
them of the real conditions through the 
daily press. The city fathers called the 
meeting and appointed a committee to in¬ 
vestigate their methods, expenses, etc. 
"With a charge hei’e of 13 cents for Grade 
B bottled milk, not pasteurized, and with 
no transportation charges, another large 
town two miles away was getting Grade 
A, bottled, pasteurized milk at 11 cents 
in October, clearly showung that profits 
were excessive when Grade B milks sells 
for 13 cents. 
Poor Business Management. —One 
retailer pleaded excessive overhead costs 
in his business. lie had found one house¬ 
wife who had 20 of his milk bottles filled 
with catsup. The city fathers told him 
to look after his bottles better; that no 
other concern allowed such careless waste 
and expected to succeed. Another said 
he had just lost a bill of $57 to a cus¬ 
tomer who was no good. On inquiry as 
to who the man was, the fathers told the 
retailer that his customer was well known 
to every business man in town as a dead 
beat; not a peanut vender in town would 
trust him with a nickel. If he was so 
careless in conducting his business he 
should not expect to raise the price of 
milk to cover his owm carelessness and 
poor business management. The retailers 
were also told to lay out their routes by 
streets and not overlap them unnecessar¬ 
ily. When grocers and merchants are cut¬ 
ting down delivery charges and exacting 
a cash price for each delivery it is an 
outrage that each house on a street has a 
different milkman, their routes crossing 
and interlacing in a web so intricate as 
to be unbelievable in any other legitimate 
business. 
POSSIBTLITIES FOR IMPROVEMENT.- 
Consumers can do much for themselves if 
they will set their aldermen and mayors 
after these men as they should. When 
they help themselves in this matter they 
will do it doubly, as they will help the 
producer also. This will result in more 
milk and cheaper milk. Municipalities can 
install milk-selling stations at little ex¬ 
pense, where people can buy milk at near 
wholesale prices. They can demand that 
retailers mend their methods, and make 
them conform to present war time restric¬ 
tion of unnecessary expense. The State 
should also have a hand in the marketing 
of milk. A State Farms and Markets 
Department was created at great cost, 
with comfortable salaries for its members, 
who supersede the Foods and Markets De¬ 
partment, which had begun to do prac¬ 
tical work along this line. What has the 
new department done to benefit retail 
milk conditions? 
The Federal Attitude. — The final 
and least to be understood blow dealt to 
this question was when the officials at 
Washington recently announced their ap¬ 
proval of a raise in the retail price of 
milk in New York and other cities for 
October and later month.s. and at the 
same time demanded that the Dairymen’s 
League accept less than the price they 
had set by Dr. Warren’s formula as nec¬ 
essary, if farmers were to have costs 
and a email profit. Only an overwhelming 
public opinion can correct such errors. 
If the Granges and consumers of the 
country will wake up these things cannot 
continue. a. b. 
Auburn, N. Y. 
Crop Reports 
Milk, $4 per cwt. Oats. 75c per bn. ; 
buckwheat, $1.60; wheat, $2.10 a bushel 
by weight. Butter, 55c; eggs, 75c. Good 
cows from $100 to $160 each. A poor 
crop of corn and potatoes; good crop of 
wheat and oats. Thousands of bushels of 
apples wasting that the poor children in 
the city should be eating. j. m. 
Geauga Co., O. 
Milk, October, $3.15; wheat, $2.15 per 
bu.; potatoes, $2 to $2.20; oats, 75 to 83c; 
onions, $2 to $3 ; buckwheat, $1.25; rye, 
$1.50; corn, shelled, $1.60; barley, $1.10. 
Chickens, 22 to 25c per lb. The crops 
are pretty good this season for the w'et 
weather we had. The early corn is a 
good crop. Some got their wheat out a 
little early. Help is scarce here; farmers 
go together and help one another. 
Center Co., Pa. j. a. f. 
Millersburg is a pretty good market, 
as we have quite a lot of manufacturing 
plants. Young cockerels sell for per lb., 
30c; old hens, per lb., 25c. Potatoes per 
peck, 30c; onions, per peck, 40c; toma¬ 
toes, per peck, 20c. Wheat is not mov¬ 
ing now, but is quoted at $2.10; rye, 
$1.50; corn, $1.60. Horses from $160 to 
$175; cows from $60 to $75, and $125. 
Shotes, lb., 15c. Wheat was an aver¬ 
age ; the crop was greatly improved from 
the outlook in the Spring. Oats were a 
fine crop, heavy in the grain and very 
little was damaged by rain. There will 
be quite a lot of buckwheat if the frost 
does not catch it. The farmers pulled 
through this Summer; how it will do 
next is hard to tell with more men taken 
from the farms. Very few fences got 
cleaned; we could not do it. We can 
not get any mill feed; no middlings or 
bran. It is supposed by the town people 
the farmer makes lots of money; there 
are a few w'ho do, but the bulk of the 
farmers do not. Potatoes are a failure, 
not one-third full crop. They all blighted 
in spite of spraying, but no rot so far; 
price will stay high. Some Jew in town 
bought for Winter seconds for $1 per bu.; 
larger lones for $1.60, but they will 
hardly remain at this figure. g. s. s. 
Dauphin Co., Pa. 
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Oneida, N. Y. 
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