Agricultural pricesWallace, Henry A. (Henry Agard)
Science
Agricultural prices
Wallace, Henry A. (Henry Agard)
Agriculture -- Statistics; Farm produce; Prices
Possibly it will be wise for the government to provide funds to finance
a Price Publicity Committee, to be made up of economists appointed by
our state universities and agricultural colleges. The duty of this
commission would be to make public week by week the relevant price
facts. They would point out which products are relatively high and which
are relatively low, and issue index numbers of various kinds, in an
endeavor to educate the public to fundamental price facts. The object of
such a Price Publicity Committee will be to furnish such constant
publicity that it will be difficult for any product to sell for any
length of time either above or below cost of production. And in saying
this we define cost-of-production price as that price which is necessary
in the long run to keep enough producers in the business to satisfy the
demand. It is believed that adequate publicity will favor the prevailing
of the long run cost-of-production price as opposed to the short run
supply-and-demand price.
Men in whom the laborers of the country have faith should have an
intimate, statistical knowledge of the supply and demand forces as they
make prices and as they make for the prosperity of laborers and society
as a whole. Men in whom farmers have faith should have an intimate,
statistical knowledge of labor and business problems in order that they
may know approximately when labor and business are charging fair prices
for their services. Business men already have a fair statistical
knowledge of farming and labor conditions, but they need an even more
intimate knowledge, as well as a change of heart. They must learn to
operate their businesses from the standpoint of greatest service and a
fair profit, not from the standpoint of greatest profit. Those
businesses which do not learn this may expect to be taken over either by
the government, organized labor, or organized farmers, if not in one
way, then in another.
SUPPLY AND DEMAND
Both farmers and city consumers have expressed much dissatisfaction in
recent years with the methods of price determination as used by the
boards of trade and packing houses. The representatives of the boards of
trade and packing houses have answered these complaints with the simple
formula, “supply and demand.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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