THE SIGNIFICANCE OF FARM ADJUSTMENT PROBLEMS TO SOCIOLOGY.

It is informed that national affluence, along with increased agricultural technological efficiency, surplus production, and the inelasticity of demand for food products has resulted in a cost-price squeeze for farmers. This situation demands as a solution that surplus farmers be helped to transfer to other forms of employment where they will presumably prosper along with the lesser number of farmers left behind to operate the larger farms. It is opined that national affluence simply occurred presumably as a result of the Adam Smith laissez-faire operation of the market place, and there is no alternative for farmers other than to adjust to this affluence by reducing their number. Presumably, the prosperity of such adjusting farmers will be increased, although they will move into an economy where technological advances are displacing manual labor and small entrepreneurs at a rate probably equal to or greater than that in agriculture. It is opined that whatever prosperity farmers do and will have can be attributed in large measure to the organized auspices through which their goods are produced and marketed.