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Show Regulation of Farm Prices Proves to Be Tough Job 'Parity' Is Goal of Agriculture Department; Uncle Sam Is Busy Figuring Out His Current Family Budget. ill By BAUKHAGE National Farm and Home Hour Commentator. WNU Service, 1343 H Street, N. W., Washington, D. C. "Runaway horse!" It's a long time since I've heard that cry that used to bring boys out of the barber shop and the livery stable on Main Street and send the buggies to hugging the curb. Then down the street he'd come, head-up, wild-eyed, mane flying, the driver hat off, jaw set, feet against the dash-board and the wagon bouncing on one wheel. WeI, you may hear that cry again soon ' for there's a nervous animal with bit in its teeth right now that has some of the folks in the department depart-ment of agriculture pretty worried. Its name is "farm prices" and it has been pretty skittish of late. By the time this appears in print Uncle Sam may have a curb in its mouth. I talked with the government's official of-ficial wild-horse tamer, Leon Henderson Hen-derson (administrator of the OPACS, Office of Price Administration Administra-tion and Civilian Supply) this morning morn-ing and right now he is inclined to let farm prices have their head and see if the farmer himself cannot keep them in control until they adjust ad-just themselves to parity. Legislative Teeth. If he can't Mr. Henderson will take a hand and the way things look now congress will probably give the OPACS legislative teeth. If that has not happened by the time you read this, put it down in your book that it is coming: a law that will mean fine or jail for the people who do boost prices beyond any figure the OPACS sets. Eight now all the department of agriculture is doing is begging, pleading, imploring that the farmer keep his shirt on. "Pon't set your sites any higher than parity!" is the message an official asked me to carry to you. "You are going to get parity," he added, "with conservation payments i plus the 85 per cent parity law. And for heaven's sake don't go into an orgy of land-buying the way you did in 1917 for if you do the old cycle will be here again: inflation, deflation defla-tion and disaster! "Of course part of the trouble which the farmer hasn't anything to do with, is caused by the speculators," specula-tors," he said. "Since speculation in wheat and corn futures is now reduced re-duced to a minimum the idle hands of the produce gamblers have found other work to do. They have turned, to cite one example, to the humble soy bean, now $1.40 a bushel. If you go to Chicago and look at the Exchange you'll find more brokers crowded into the little bean pit than there are in the corn pit Supply and Demand. "Shortage of ships, and high shipping ship-ping rates are legitimate reasons for the increase in soy bean values because the supply of fats and oils which we have to import is reduced. But the farmer can help in this case for the department of agriculture has taken off the restriction on raising rais-ing soy beans for sale instead of plowing the unripened plants under for conservation purposes. Harvest the beans. Supply will ease the demand de-mand pressure and help keep the ' prices normal." That supply-and-demand factor is one reason why Leon Henderson has not been so concerned over the farm price situation. The threat of curtailed cur-tailed supply in farm products does not compare with the threat of curtailed cur-tailed supply in other lines, like aluminum, copper and other essentials essen-tials for defense. Henderson lists the reasons for general price rises this way: 1. Ocean freight rates that applies ap-plies to coffee, cocoa, shellac, rubber rub-ber and a lot of other things we don't grow in this country. 2. Wage rates. Even if they are not always a genuine cause for boosting prices they areexcellent excuses. 3. Pressure to get food for Britain. Brit-ain. Incidentally this has caused cheese prices to go up because a lot of cheese is being hoarded for higher prices. It is one of the chief needs of Great Britain. 4. Then, the thing we have mentioned men-tioned before, the extraordinary increase in-crease of money in the wage-earner's pockets due to re-employment. I asked Henderson what the biggest big-gest obstacle to keeping prices down was and his answer reminded me that he started out with the New Deal in the NRA. His answer was "chiseling." It was harder, he told me, to control con-trol prices in a field where there are a great many different concerns in the industry. The majority might agree but the chiselers would start edging up prices and the rest would follow in self-defense. Greed. That is what is back of most of the trouble of human society not to mention animal society. If you try to get all there is in the dish by pushing everybody else away you may knock it over and get nothing. Don't let that horse get its head or there'll be a runaway! Your Uncle Sam Figures His Budget This is the time of the fiscal year when Uncle Sam sits down and figures fig-ures out his family budget. If he did it by the calendar year instead of every first of July it would have been easier because he has planned a lot of new expenditures since January. Jan-uary. Harold D. Smith, director of the bureau of the budget, handed your Uncle a piece of paper with this written on it: Army 20 Navy 14 Other agencies 2 Lend Lease 7 43 Forty-three! Not such a big figure fig-ure except that Mr. Smith left off nine ciphers from force of habit. Forty-three billions are the appropriations, appro-priations, authorizations and pending pend-ing recommendations of expenses for the government for the fiscal year beginning on July 1. Not all of the things undertaken during this time will be completed in the coming com-ing fiscal year, but it is estimated that $22,169,000,000 will be the year's actual expenditures. Another figure which Uncle Sam is gazing upon hopefully is $9,402,000,-000. $9,402,000,-000. .That's the amount that Uncle Sam expects to collect from the family fam-ily in other words the income from the taxation and borrowing. Secretary Secre-tary of the Treasury Morgenthau thought earlier in the year that two-thirds two-thirds of this figure would be met through taxes and the other third through borrowing. But with increased in-creased defense expenditures changing chang-ing the picture he is no longer sure of this distribution of the source of income. And then comes the last figure $12,867,000,000. But why bother? That's only the expected deficit for the coming fiscal year. Farm Labor Problem Vexes U. S. Agencies Farm labor is still a problem that is vexing government agencies as well as the farmer. Pressure is being brought on the selective service system to allow some of the boys already inducted into the army to return home to help with the harvest. I asked selective service officials if any steps had been taken in this direction. But they told me that so far the figures seem to indicate that it is not the army that has robbed the farm it is the defense industries. "In agricultural areas," a defense official has just told me, "where seasonal demands create a serious situation induction may be delayed 60 days. And if congress feels the same as it seems to at this writing, nobody 28 years of age and over will be called." That suits the selective service system they predict that they can get all of the 800,000 men they need. Although from the first they have felt that men 28 and over should be deferred by statute, they do not want these men removed entirely from the lists. Other Labor Trouble The farm is not the only place in America where labor shortage is evident. Here in Washington the telegraph companies are having trouble getting messenger boys, and both the biological survey and the forest service are complaining that they cannot get the help from the CCC they used to. The CCC boys, of course, get jobs in factories that pay them a lot better than the $30 a month they get in the camps. |