But although we are all up against the same general laws that govern business there is a difference between farming and most other business. A contractor will build a building for us if we agree to pay a price that he figures will pay his cost plus a profit. Otherwise he will not do the work. Contracting is supposed to be a somewhat hazardous business but it is not so risky as farming for the builder knows before he starts what price he is to get. A farmer can not tell until he is ready to market his crop what the market will be. The farmer must pay the cost, hoping. Weather has a great deal to do with results in farming operations and that makes the business more risky. Business men in cities as a rule can work much closer to their pay checks. This makes it possible for them to come much nearer a system of always getting cost plus a profit. Manufacturers usually aim to take orders ahead of their output so that knowing their cost and having their goods already sold at a profit leaves them comparatively clear sailing. How the farmer can get on the same basis I do not know. But city business is not all a round of pleasure, for city competition is keen. If one farmer raises forty bushels of corn per acre and another can raise sixty, each receives compensation in proportion to his crop. But if one merchant had that much advantage over his competitor the unfortunate one would be put clear out of business. Customers to a merchant are as valuable as pigs are to a farmer and it is perfectly legal to get the other fellow’s customers in broad daylight. So we in competitive business keep busier than some people think. I have often been asked what I think of farmers’ organizations. Well, most business men in other lines of business have associations. They usually result in some good. It is those who expect too much that are disappointed. So simple a thing as an organization can not cure all of the difficulties in farming. Some farmers in Kentucky organized to boost the tobacco market by agreeing among themselves to plant fewer acres. After the agreement many expected a high price for tobacco and planted more acres. This is about the kind of co-operation we all have learned to expect in associations where money interests are involved. These farmers were right, however, in realizing that in order to boost the market they had to limit the supply of the product. The law of supply and demand always works. It works to the advantage of him who can limit the supply or can increase the demand.