U.S
Prescribes Single Medicine To Cure All Farm Ailment!
By JOHN STKOH.M
Newspaper Enterprise Ann
WASHINGTON (NEA1 - If you!
heard your doctor was treating
all his patients with one tonic
you would swear he was crazy
Vet politicians have been trying
(or .10 years to cure the ills of
all farmers with a serum called
the "farm program."
Despite three decades of fail
urea costing taxpayers $48.6 bil
lion, government planners are
trying to convince Congress acain
this year that farm prosperity can
he legislated through controlled
scarcity.
Can Legislation Solve
the "Farm Problem"?
I've just surveyed land grant
college agricultural economists
in 30 states. Their overwhelm
ing conviction: Legislation has
not solved, and will not solve
the farm problem although
"the right kind might help."
These specialists know the farm
problem better than anyone in the
country. They are economic doc
tors, not political doctors. Therel
is no party prestige at stake, no
threat of being clobbered at the
polls by voters for taking the
stand they do.
Four out of five believe farm
program money is not being spent
wisely. Mervin fcmith, chairman
of the agricultural economics de
partment at Ohio State Uni
versity, says:
"Legislation mav even have
tcnsilied the farm problem and
retarded the real adjustments
needed."
Secretary of Agriculture Oi ville
Freeman's intentions are good:
Help farmers who can't make a
decent living. But his program is
missing the target badly. IBM
machines doling out your tax dol
lars don't recognize need. Farm
ers who need help most get the
least,
The real farm problem is a
social problem a million farm
ers who no longer are needed to
produce our food and fiber, be
cause arm workers using me
chanical muscles and scientific
know-how produce three times as
much per man now as they did
2(1 years ago.
It doesn't make any moi e
sense to legislate higher income
for farmers who should not be
farming than it would to pay
grocery store owners for selling
less produce, so the underii
nanced and less efficient corner
grocer can stay in business.
Should Taxpayers
Be Excited?
because your tax bill
Yes
ready takes the biggest single
slice of your family income. The
average taxpayer shelled out
nearly $100 last year for the farm
program.
How About llomrmakers?
Although still the greatest bar
gain you have, food is the second
biggest item in your family budg
et. If government raises farm
prices through controlled scarcity
'one of the original aims of the
Kennedy administration i.
recr economists in the I'.S. De
partment of Agriculture say food
prices would jump 23 per cent
liive a farmer 4 cents a quart
more for milk, and the housewife
will pay at least 4 cents more.
If the hog producer gets $3 per
hundredweight more, vour pork
chops' will cost S cents a pound
more.
Should We Be Concerned
As Citizens?
The Farm Bureau the na-
tions's largest organization says
government already has eroded
seriously into a farmer's freedom
to plan. More than 1.5(0 wheat
larmers have been fined or had
their farms auctioned off for grow
ing more wheat than their allot
led acreage even though they
led the grain to their own live
stock on their own farms.
Farm programs have lost us
foreign markets. Larry Simcrl.
economist at the University of
lllionois, says. "We can't have
freer trade and still prop domes
tic farm prices above the world."
REVOLUTION CREATES A (PROBLEM Technological revolution has created the social proble
needed farmers.
m et a million un-
Cotton, supported at high pric
es, is losing out to svnthetics
at home, too.
It flabbergasts American ex
perts I talked with in the Far
Fast to think that we're stepping
up el forts to have scarcity dow n
the farm at the time when
half the world is hungry and
when the Communists are lashing
farmers to greater effort to keep
their people from starving.
Do Farm Programs
Help the Farmer?
Farmers who produce most of
the total output have no farm
program, and lor the most part
want none. "We are in best ad
justment for livestock, fruits, and
pcgotables, on which farmers
less to sell at price supported levels.
"The price support approach has
had little real effect on income
of the small farmer," savs Fred
Saunders, economist at the Uni
versity of Georgia. Others feel
government payments actually
have harmed small farmers, en
couraging them to hang on and
to hope when they might have
been better off in nonfarm jobs.
"In one sense, successful farm
ers have been hurt, too, because
of the unwarranted public image
of charitable handouts, says Alan
Bird, economist at the University
of Massachusetts.
What Altout Crop .Surpluses?
Surpluses are made in Wash
A, '
- "awww, I W. wwa, 75
,.:rl. v-.
9
1
I
free reign to all farm program
of the last 20 years and a $10
billion budget, it still wouldn't he
iwssible to correct economic im
balance in agriculture," Is the
opinion of T. W. Schultz, head
of the economics department at
the University of Chicago.
"None of our programs have
been aimed at increasing human
resources." explains Schultz,
"They only increase land value
"Basic philosophy or the MM
program still is inconsistent with
national economic growth and
progress." says Donald Kaldor,
economist at Iowa Slate Universi
ty. "It unemploys resources in
stead of getting them reallocated
to more productive employment.
Are We Afraid to Tac kle
the Surplus of Farmers?
If we're going to pull our
selves out of this mess, .sooner
or later we must face the fact
that we'll need a human welfare
program," says economist
Schultz. "The U.S. Department
of Agriculture is making a noise
in this area now, but it's just a
piddling compared to their efforts
in price and income support."
Only group so far with guts
enough to say: "Put your money
on jieople and not on properties."
is tlie Committee for Kconomic
Development, a nonprolil and
noniolitical organization of busi
nessmen and educators in devel
oping policies to raise national
productivity and living standards.
CED spokesmen recently re
leased a report which said the
heart of the problem is the need
to adjust unneeded resources out
of agriculture including 2 mil
lion workers.
A howl of anguish went up from
farmers, politicians and other in
terested groups blasting the con
clusion as a disregard for human
values.
But the CED's research and
policy committee says its plan
will slash government spending
for agriculture by $.1 billion year
ly within five years and raise
larmers' income.
The program would have gov-
ernment educate farm workers in
other skills, provide job informa
tion and defray the costs of mov
ing them to oilier locations.
As ail example, let's say $r.(NKi
would be the average cost per
family assisted. "IT this would
be sufficient incentive lor 2.MI.O0O
eligible commercial farm fami
lies to move per year, including
50,000 who may have moved any
way, cost per year would be $l 25
billion." says Riley S. Dougan.
Ohio State University economist,
who also studied the need to help
larmers adjust to nonfarm jobs.
(Cost of I9t3 program for price
and income support and foreign
disposal will be $5 billion, esti
mates Dr. Schultz.)
After five years of a program
such as proposed by Dougan and
others, the number of farmers
would be reduced to around 1.5
million. This is about the number
of commcrical larmers today,
most of whom are making a
good living. It is also about the
number we need.
"Keep in mind that all sectors
of the economy have their built-
in stabilizers, such as minimum
wage, tax write-offs and subsi
dies," says J. S. Hillman, head
of the University of Arizona. "Ag
riculture also must have its sta
bilizers." "But a complementary supioit
program would not cost a great
deal if it were used almost en
tirely as a price-stabilizer me
chanism rather than a price-raising
mechanism," savs Ohio Stale's
Dougan.
Does This Farm Program
Make Sense?
Yes, according to an overwhelm
ing majority of economists, farm
management specialists, industrial
leaders and farmers 1 interviewed.
Rcwardi are great. The pro
gram would eventually save $5
billion in taxes per year. It would
assure a continued supply of food
and fiber or the housewife at a
reasonable price. It would be an
incentive for farmers to become
more efficient, to develop foreign
markets that pay in dollars and
to help provide abundance in the
world of want.
What do we have to lose
except the fears of the planners I NEXT: .Modern Commercial
and the jobs of some bureau- Farmer: Man Behind Your Food
crals? Bargain.)
Wednesday, February 13, 1!M2 PAGE J A
HERALD AND NEWS, Klamath Falls, Ore.
IS
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MECHANIZED MUSCLE The problem of the American
form is heightened by the u$e of mechanical aids such as
the one pictured above. Producing a surplus has been
made easier.
MACHINES PRODUCE Mechanical muscle on the farm
results in - . . billions of tons of surplus food and fiber.
make their own decisions, says
Don Paailberg. economist at Pur
due University. "We are in poor
est adjustment for wheat and the
feed grains on which the gov
ernment sets the price and pro
duction pattern.
Hog producers and cattle rais
ers have successfully resisted at
tempts to force a government
"help" program on them, and they
represent two of the healthiest
segments ot agriculture.
Wheat, which alone has cost
taxpayers $10 billion, slill is in
worst trouble of all crops.
The underemployed farmer.
who needs help most gels the
least, because he has less land
to take out of production for re
lirement payments, and he has
ington. As long as government
offers to pay more than market
price for corn or cotton, .surplus
es will pile up. Uncle Sam could
quickly own surpluses of beer.
buggv whips and neckties if he
outbid the market for those items.
Is There a Solution?
Yes. If politicians are willing
tackle the real problem: Sur
plus of farmers not corn, wheat
or rotton.
If Secrelary Freeman bad
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