AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 281 who had to sell, because he could not hold, while the one who was better off and could hold up to 15 cents got the benefit. Mr. AsweLL. If you had stopped buying when it reached 15 cents and stabilized, would you not have sold for 18 cents? Mr. KiLgore. I do not know. I think with hind sight we would have sold at 18 cents, and maybe something better than 18 cents. Mr. AswerLL. Then there would not have been any loss in that operation. Mr. KiLcore. If we had bought the cotton at 15 cents and sold it at 18 cents, certainly there would have been a profit. Mr. AswerLr. What would you have done with that equalization fee, if you had had an equalization fee? Mr. KiLcore. That equalization fee would now be a part of the stabilization fund for cotton right there, ready to be used in future years of operation. Mr. Apkins. You could have used it to repay the money borrowed from the Government? Mr. KiLGore. It could have been used to repay the money bor- rowed from the revolving fund. Mr. FuLmeR. Doctor, if we had the machinery now proposed to be set up under this bill, and the money at hand, do you believe cotton would be going down as it has been for the last two months, in the face of a very short crop for the past year? Mr. KiLGore. I do not think so, Mr. Fulmer. Cotton is below the cost of average production now, and has been for the last two months. It may not be enough below the cost for the board to come in there and say, “We will pay 17 cents or more for cotton, but I do think that under a bill of the kind that the McNary-Haugen bill is, with its equalization fee which guarantees the return of any losses to the revolving fund, the board would be more liberal; that it would take greater chances in stabilizing a price more nearly the cost of production of cotton than it would on a mere loan bill where there is no such guarantee for the repayment of loans such as the equalization fee affords. Mr. KercaaM. Now, Doctor, let me come back to the illustration and ask you to give a moment to it. Mr. KiLGoRE. Yes. Mr. Kercuam. I want to follow that through with a few more questions. If I understood you correctly, we assumed that the price last year was 12 cents a pound on the average, and that the production was 18,000,000 bales, and you said you thought a fair price would have been attained had the equilization fee been in opera- tion and the board set in operation, of around 15 cents a pound. ry KiLcore. That would have been conservative and none too iberal. Mr. KercHaM. It is none too liberal? Mr. KiLcore. None too liberal. Mr. KercaaMm. I want it to be that way. Let us see if these figures are right. If I have made the computation correctly, I find that, in the first instance, that at $60 per bale his receipts from the cotton crop would have been $1,080,000,000, and, in the second Instance, $1,350,000,000. I have not checked the accuracy of those figures, but I think they are approximately correct—illustrating the difference to the farmers it would have been realized in the return from the crop