Economic essays

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Identifikator:: 1753623200

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-136107

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Economic essays

Place of publication:: New York

Publisher:: Macmillan

Year of publication:: 1927

Scope:: viii, 368 S.; Ill., graph. Darst.

Digitisation:: 2021

Collection:: Economics Books

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Document type:: Monograph

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Title:: The holding movement in agriculture / Jesse E. Pope

Collection:: Economics Books

THE HOLDING MOVEMENT IN AGRICULTURE 271 the twelve-year period, 1910 to 1921, reveals no such condition. The average farm price for wool for the quarter ending July 31st is given by the Department of Agriculture at twenty-nine and one-half cents per pound. For the quarter ending December 31st the average price was twenty-seven and eight-tenths cents per pound and for the quarter ending April 31st, almost a year after shearing, the average price was thirty cents per pound. If the farmer had sold in July, when his wool was ready, he would have received twenty-nine cents a pound. If he had held for the very highest seasonal price, that of the following March he would have received thirty and six-tenths cents per pound. The difference, one and six-tenths cents a pound, minus the cost of carrying, represents his gain. The quarterly prices for scoured territory wool, Boston, cover- ing the same period, are quite as convincing. The average price for the quarter ending July 31st was $1.02 per pound; for the quarter ending December 31st, $1.00 6/10 per pound and for the quarter ending April 31st, $1.00 3/10 per pound. (Year Book, Department of Agriculture, 1921, p. 720.) Statistics covering the four years from 1922 to 1926 show sub- stantially the same results. In every year but one, if shrinkage and carrying charges be taken into account those farmers who did not sell their wool immediately after shearing suffered severe losses. (Year Book, Dept. of Agriculture, 1925, p. 1173. Crops and Markets, Jan. 1927, p. 32.) The study of price movement for other agricultural products not traded in on the exchanges show results paralleling those for wool. The conclusion is, therefore, inevitable that the normal working of the law of supply and demand in the highly developed market of today brings about such an adjustment of prices that the withholding of crops from the market for higher seasonal prices does not usually result in gain to the holding farmer but may involve him in speculative losses. He is fortunate indeed if his delayed marketing compensates him for his carrying charges. This significant fact is not openly admitted by the advocates of the Holding Movement but the entire trend of recent attempts at legislation for farm relief speaks eloquently of its tacit accept- ance by them. For the past three years they have placed emphasis not upon the advantages of later seasonal prices but upon the possibility of raising prices through the creation of a

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