In its simplest form, the ratio method deals with only two products, as for example, with hogs and corn. As an average of the ten Januarys extending from 1907 to 1916, No. 2 corn on the Chicago market sold for 59.9 cents a bushel, and heavy hogs on the same market sold for $7 per hundredweight. In other words, as an average of this ten-year period, it has required the value of 11.7 bushels of corn to equal in value one hundred pounds of heavy hog flesh. In the specific month of January, 1907, corn was 41.6 cents per bushel. The corn price of hogs was 11.7 times 41.6 cents, or $4.87. The actual price of hogs in January, 1907, was $6.60. Actual hogs sold for $1.73 above the customary corn-hog ratio. In January of 1908, with corn at 58.5 cents a bushel, the corn price of hogs would be 11.7 times 58.5, or $6.84. The actual price was $4.45, or $2.39 below the ratio price. The ratio for February is different from the ratio for January, but once a set of ratios is secured for each of the twelve months of the year, it is easily possible to work out charts showing month by month the periods of time when hogs were selling relatively higher than their customary ratio to corn, and when they were selling relatively lower. It is absolutely necessary to work ratios month by month, or week by week, in the case of all products which have a seasonal swing. Nearly all agricultural products are cheap in the fall of the year. Some products begin weakening sooner than others; for instance, oats and wheat weaken sooner than corn or hogs. A genuinely scientific method of applying the ratio method to hog prices would also take into consideration that hogs are to some extent made out of tankage, pasture and labor, as well as corn. Of course, these things vary in value in a rough way, in just about the same way as corn prices, and for practical purposes, the ratio between hogs and corn is probably exact enough.