Agricultural relief: Agricultural relief

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Multivolume work

Identifikator:: 1831932415

Document type:: Multivolume work

Title:: Agricultural relief

Place of publication:: Washington

Publisher:: Gov. Pr. Off.

Year of publication:: 1928

Collection:: Economics Books

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Volume

Identifikator:: 1831935066

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-232142

Document type:: Volume

Title:: Agricultural relief

Volume count:: Pt. 7

Place of publication:: Washington

Publisher:: Gov. Pr. Off.

Year of publication:: 1928

Scope:: III S., S. 521 - 590

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 525 Commission had even less power, as I think, when it was originally conceived and established than this board, even if it were granted only very modest ones. It was through the study and the experience and the application of the powers gradually granted to the commis- sion that we finally reached the point of the present efficient regulation of rates and the present efficient flow of the commodities of commerce through the channels of transportation. It has been suggested I think by Governor Lowden that what agriculture needs is something corresponding to the Federal reserve system. I think that illustration is meritorious and, to an extent, applicable. But we must remember in this connection that the function of the Federal reserve system is to regulate the volume and Aow of credit. Of course, that regulation has as an incidental effect in the stabilization of prices. But the Federal reserve system would not last long if its policies were predicated upon attempts to regulate the price level of commodities. There are many people who believe that in 1920 the Federal reserve system undertook the deflation of prices, and particularly of agricultural prices. I do not so believe; and I have some knowledge of what did happen. But if they did attempt to deflate prices it was a devastating and disastrous pXperiment. Mr. FvumeEr. May I interrupt you one moment? Mr. ANDERSON. Just a moment—and I should hate to see any- thing done in the attempt to regulate agricultural prices which might possibly result in an equally devastating and disastrous experience. Mr. FurLmer. You do not believe, then, Mr. Anderson, that the increase in the rediscount rate had anything to do with the decline in the bond market some days ago? Mr. AxpErsoN. I would not say that at all. What I said was, the principle upon which the board functions, the basis upon which it functions is the regulation of the volume and velocity of credit to meet the needs of business, that that had an incidental effect naturally apon the price level, and I was going to proceed from that to an analogy in connection with the marketing of agricultural products. Mr. Jones. Do you prefer to finish your statement before being questioned? Mr. AxpersoN. I would like to, although it does not bother me at all. I would like to make this part of it connectedly, and turn back to that in a moment. I want to make this analogy—and it is very difficult to make, because we are dealing with very close distinctions here, and it is difficult, in the first place, to express these fine distinctions or close distinctions in language which everybody will understand the same way. What I am getting at is there is a vast difference between attempting to regulate the volume and flow of a commodity through the channels of commerce, so as to obtain a degree of stabilization in the price during the year and over a period of years and attempting to artificially and directly stimulate those prices through market manipulations; in other words, it makes all the difference in the world in considering what we are doing here, whether what you are seeking to do is to bring about an orderly and continuous flow of these com- modities into the channels of commerce and thus stabilize the price during the crop year and over a period of years, or whether what we are trying to do is artificially to stimulate and maintain a price or

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