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ACH of the several ways of measuring the recent trends in farm income during the past ten years leads to the same general conclusions, namely: (1) that the sharp decline from 1919 to 1921 was followed by a marked recovery from 1921 to 1925 and by a fairly stable income level between 1925 and 1928; (2) that average incomes in the past four years have not been as high as in the prosperous year 1919-20 before the great price depression; and (3) that the recovery in farm income has not kept pace with the trend in incomes of other groups which in the past four years have exceeded the prosperous incomes of 1919-20. These conclusions may be derived from a review of changes in farm income either in terms of rates of return on capital used in farm production, or in terms of rewards for labor employed, or in terms of the buying power of money income in exchange for goods usually bought by farmers. It is the purpose of this paper first to review briefly the trends in farm income as reflected in the rates of return on capital and the rewards for labor as shown by the yearly published estimates of the Department of Agriculture, and then to indicate the recent trends in buying power of the farmers' money income, which we shall refer to as "real" in

the basis for a broad survey of agricultural income before, during and after the war. From the two studies it is possible to estimate the changes that have taken place in: (1) The rate of return on all capital employed in agriculture; (2) The rate of return on the capital owned by all farm operators (owners and tenants) as distinguished from the capital owned by non-farmers; (3) The rewards for the operator's labor, risk and management; (4) The distribution of the operator's income. These phases of agricultural income will be discussed in turn.

(1941). The Philadelphia Planning Conference: Land Planning. Journal of the American Institute of Planners: Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 3-6.

The Agricultural Revolution in the United States, the astonishing increase in productivity during the past 35 years, raises the question as to the relative contribution of technology and of weather. Several attempts have been made to answer this question and this paper presents the results of one of these attempts, particularly for those who are interested in general conclusions pertaining to agriculture beyond the controlled yield tests of the agricultural experiment stations.

As an aid in interpreting the outcome of the 1942 congressional election and subsequent general elections, this paper presents two basic studies that have been found very helpful in connection with the 1940 election. One of these deals with the changes in political sentiment for the country as a whole, as shown by the long-time record of relative strength of the Democratic party in the two-party vote in congressional and presidential elections. From this long-time record it is possible to derive the characteristics of our political tides and an interpretation of the most recent changes as background for forthcoming elections. For example, the Democratic party attained its greatest strength on record in 1936, but in 1938 the tide turned against it, largely because of the 1937–38 business recession. Recovery by 1940 checked the decline.The second study (in two sections) deals with the basic similarities between the pattern of political behavior for a given series of elections for the country as a whole and the political behavior of most of the states. From the “normal” relationships that can be developed between the national and state experience, it is possible to determine the influence of certain major issues, such as the isolationist and third-term issues in 1940. In that election, the Eastern and Far Western states voted more Democratic and the Midwestern and Great Plains states voted less Democratic than usual. These discrepancies are immediately traceable more to isolationist and anti-third-term sentiment than to any of the other issues.

(1924). Four Types of Index Numbers of Farm Prices. Journal of the American Statistical Association: Vol. 19, No. 145, pp. 30-35.

during the next few years and whether that experience is likely to be a happier one than their experience of the past 20 years. The other method that suggested itself was to deal with it in general terms, extracting from the abundant material on prices, production costs, debt burdens, net incomes, and living standards such quantitative relationships as might clarify our understanding of what has happened, so that it might give us a surer basis for judging probable effects should inflation come again. The third was to select a specific problem and deal with it in greater detail and carry it to a point or two beyond previous studies in the same field. From the standpoint of current interest, the first approach might have been the one to take, but to make a forecast as to inflation calls for more intuitive wisdom than we possess. The second approach might have been a more generally useful one and would have been the substance of this paper had it not been necessary to devote considerable time during the past few days in trying to understand only one of the specific problems involved in the relation of inflation to the farmer, that specific topic being the relation of farm prices to land values, a relation that involves the rapid building up of a debt and cost structure during inflation to plague farmers during many years of deflation. The substance of this paper is therefore limited to an attempt to see how the price fluctuations of the past 25 years and incomes of the past 13 years were translated into variations in land values. In this 25-year period we had a price rise of 130 per cent between 1914 and 1919, a 20 per cent rise between 1921 and 1925, and a 110 per cent rise between 1932 and 1937. We had two periods of sharp deflation, a 30 per cent deflation between 1919 and 1921 and a 60 per cent deflation between 1929 and 1932. Any assumption as to future inflation or deflation is certain to fall within the range of this experience. The quantitative relationships between prices of farm products and the price of land, and the nature of their cumulative effects, based on such wide fluctuations, should be of some use whether we assume inflation, deflation, or price stability for the future.

JT was something of a shock to many economists to learn from Secretary of Agriculture Brannan's testimony before a Congressional committee (April I95I) that farmers in I950 had earned on the average only 69 cents per hour for their labor compared with a national minimum wage of 75 cents an hour and rates of one to two dollars or more in other occupations. The 69-cent average (now revised to 70 cents) seemed contrary to several common notions. It did not square with the general belief that "farmers are getting too much." It seemed out of line with the many undeniable cases of real farm prosperity. Since it was an official figure, friendly critics argued not that it was inaccurate but that it was unduly weighted downward by including the many submarginal farmers who produce very little for the markets. Others raised additional questions, particularly as to the "validity" of comparing farm returns per hour with returns per hour in other occupations, and as to why people living on farms are willing to take less in dollar income. The problem of comparing farm with nonfarm income has been a baffling one for many years; in fact, ever since the annual estimates of farm income were started more than 25 years ago. Ir the I92 0'S, "equality for agriculture," "parity," and "the farmers' share of the national income" were phrases in common use by farm leaders, agricultural politicians, and agricultural economists. The specialists in farm income comparisons in the 1920's recognized that farmers were both entrepreneurs and laborers; that farming was both a business and a way of life; and, if comparisons with nonfarm income were to be made, it was necessary to assign some value for the farmer's labor to get the residual return on his capital, or to assign some value for the use of his capital and management in order to compute the residual return for his labor. This, of course, is still an arithmetical necessity. There are other debated issues, such as how to impute values to production used in the farm home and how to deal with the differences between other elements in farm and nonfarm living standards. Agricultural statistics have been expanded and improved a great deal over the past twentyfive years, and a great deal more is known about farm income and the national income, about per capita farm and nonfarm income, about the size and distribution of farm and nonfarm income, and about the reduced labor and increased capital requirements in agricultural production, but for the most part the basic questions in comparative income are still unsolved.

Each of these four policy areas, Cochrane says, contain gaps in data, gaps in collection methodology, and gaps in data refinement and presentation. The greatest lack, he says, relates to the organization of livestock production and distribution of livestock products, to rural America, and to the whole range of production and marketing in the underdeveloped countries. Collection methodology gaps concern him less than do these gaps in basic data. He gives SRS a high score for doing a good job, for knowing the methods necessary for collecting relevant and reliable data needed for rural area policies. It is in our livestock industry statistics and in foreign agricultural development statistics where the really great methodological gaps exist. He gives us the reasons why: lack of funds, low literacy levels, and the lack of data reliability. The third, the data refinement gap, the failure to put data into mean

Major business and agricultural depressions that periodically sweep over the country tend to restore a more balanced sense of economic realities. During such trials we tend to learn again the lesson that sustained agricultural well-being depends on sustained industrial prosperity here and abroad. During the few years of sustained urban prosperity prior to the collapse in the last half of 1929-years when domestic demand conditions were relatively stable-it appeared to some that the farmers' problems were largely of their own making, with only minor influences due to industrial conditions. Some even attempted to prove statistically that most of the variations in farm prices and farm income are due to variations in supply. The events of 1930 and 1931, however, have again demonstrated how a business depression sweeping over the entire country drags farmers down to the despair of profitless production and the loss of their land just as it reduces millions of industrial workers to the dire want of the jobless. The purpose of this statement is to point out a few specific influences of the 1930 business depression on agriculture, and to present certain facts of aggregate production, prices and income for the country as a whole which show fairly clearly how the great changes in general demand conditions, and not production, were the chief factors in the collapse in farm income in 1930 and 1931. These facts together with others that have to do with inflexible taxes, debts, operating costs; with competition between farmers of different regions, between farmers and unemployed city labor, and with foreign demand and competition and the vagaries of nature, point to the tremendous difficulties in the way of regional or national agricultural adjustments to demand conditions weighed down by national and international forces. Being practically insuperable, these difficulties lend 'reasonableness to the point of view, now frequently heard, that a solution of the present agricultural depression depends more on restoring industrial prosperity than on adjusting agricultural production to the reduced demand. Some of the effects that a business depression can have on

THE course of commodity prices during World War II and the first postwar year has been generally inverse to the course of stock market prices, especially if each is considered in relation to its trend. A similar inverse relationship developed during and after World War I. The commodity price movements of i9i6-20 and I940-46 show roughly the same general pattern, and there is a general similarity between the broad movements of stock prices for the two periods. In each postwar year, i9i8-i9 and I945-46, stock prices advanced sharply, but turned down as commodity prices started rising sharply, and in each case commodity prices remained high several months after the peak in stock prices. These observations are based on the two sets of records in Charts i and 2. Chart i presents the monthly record of wholesale commodity prices from I940 to the fall of I946, and a similar record of industrial stock prices. In order to emphasize the differences in the rate of change in prices, trend lines have been drawn in. They, of course, have no particular significance beyond their aid to

In recent years considerable attention has been given to the problem of stabilizing the business cycle. Much is hoped from the recent progress in standardization, in a more even distribution of employment in the highly seasonal industries, such as the building, clothing, and canning industries, and in the more adequate organization of the nation's financial and credit institutions. One important element, namely agriculture, has, however, received inadequate consideration, but it will need to be taken into account before stability in general business conditions is ever accomplished. Agriculture, which supplies the raw materials to industries employing at least one-third of all factory wage earners, and upon whose income depends the welfare of many individual industries and enterprises, has of course been much discussed, but the specific ways in which agricultural production contributes to the physical volume of general business, how agricultural prices may affect business activity through their influence on industrial profits and urban living costs, and how farmers' income affects the welfare of specific industries serving the farm market, have not generally been recognized. The interrelationships between agriculture and industry are so diverse and numerous that many views---some of them misconceptions-are afloat. Agriculture is frequently given an importance in national welfare, depending on the individual viewpoint, which ranges all the way from a dominant factor to one of little influence or significance. The latter view is likely to be held by those whose interests do not bring them directly in contact with farmers, or who see in agriculture a declining element in our population as the country moves on to a greater degree of industrialization. Others, whose interests are intimately associated with the welfare of agricultural communities, are apt to think that the nation's business rises and falls with the ups and downs of the farmer. Among these are to be found country bankers, country editors, manufacturers and distributors of farm implements, machin

(1967). Rejoinder to “Mr. Bean and the Weather”. The American Statistician: Vol. 21, No. 5, pp. 13-14.

This paper deals with certain long-time trends in cotton production and consumption in the United States and abroad purely from the statistical standpoint. A great deal has been said in the past three years about the effect of the cotton policies of the United States and the foreign markets for American cotton, and most of what has been said has turned on the very limited facts of the past four years. One of the commonest devices has been to contrast the restricted production of 1933-1936 with the expanding production abroad and with the reduced exports and foreign consumption. And one of the obvious conclusions derived from these simple short-range facts is that by adopting an unrestricted and therefore comparatively large production, the low prices resulting would check foreign expansion and stimulate our exports., The data presented here call for a reconsideration of that simple conclusion. The economic and political forces at work in the world in shaping the course of foreign cotton production and trade are much too complex to justify the acceptance of that conclusion without a careful and searching examination. This paper is not to be taken as praising or criticizing the cotton programs, or criticizing the opponents of those programs. It argues neither for nor against loan programs, unrestricted production, export subsidies or other course of action. Nor does it argue for a high price policy with huge stocks held by the federal government as opposed to a low price policy and moderate or no holdings. Furthermore, it is not intended to leave the impression that the price of American cotton has not influenced and will not influence production and