220 ECONOMIC ESSAYS IN HONOR OF JOHN BATES CLARK 
more acres of corn ground, and the fields have mounted the stiff 
slopes that were formerly reserved for pasture. Thus the tilled 
area has been doubled since the time of the original settler. 
At first glance one would infer that this was merely an instance 
of the worn-out farm. But on closer inspection the inference 
proves misleading. The fields on the level show splendid yields 
of wheat and corn, and even the slopes are productive, in spite 
of yellow streaks betokening erosion, which becomes more serious 
year by year. Since the nineties agricultural practice has made 
notable progress. On soils of equal fertility the Marquis wheat 
of to-day yields two bushels more per acre than the Minnesota 
Fife of the nineties. The present strains of yellow dent corn are 
more prolific, perhaps by three or four bushels, than the hard 
kernelled varieties of thirty years ago. The introduction of 
alfalfa has simplified the problems of pasturage and hay: the use 
of the silo has added greatly to the value of the roughage from the 
cornfields. The breeds of cattle and swine have been much 
improved; hog cholera has been stamped out and the risks from 
bovine tuberculosis are steadily diminishing. These gains in farm 
practice certainly outweigh any loss through the exhaustion of the 
elements of fertility in the soil. And if more care and labor are 
required to reap the benefits of improved practise, the progress 
in the efficiency and ease of operation of agricultural machinery 
is more than a sufficient offset. 
As a fact, except for a small part of the acreage that has been 
spoiled by water logging and erosion, every acre yields a larger 
physical product than it did in the nineties. Moreover, every 
day’s labor on it accomplishes more, measured in physical 
product, than in the nineties. 
It is not, however, physical product as such that makes for 
prosperity, but value product, or physical product in terms of 
price. And the whole farming population is clamoring that the 
prices of agricultural products are too low. This may be true. It 
is not an easy matter to determine at just what level agricultural 
prices are fair and just. But for the sake of the argument we will 
admit that they are now unfairly and unjustly low. So they were 
in the eighties and nineties too. 'The farmer of that period did 
not buy so many things as the farmer of today. He raised his 
horses and hay for them, where the farmer of today buys cars 
and tractors, and the gasoline and oil they require. In the