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Show Farm I Iopics I MORTGAGE DEBT SHOWS DECLINE Farm Liens Are Lowest in Twenty Years. The farm mortgage debt stands at approximately $7,000,000,000 it is reported by the bureau of agricultural agricul-tural economics. This is the smallest small-est figure in 20 years, and compares with the high record of nearly $11,000,000,000 in the early 1920s. Officials said the debt has been reduced markedly during the current cur-rent decade from $9,631,000,000 in 1930 to $7,071,000,000 in 1939 but is still much higher than in the years immediately preceding the World war a quarter century ago. Much of the reduction during the early 1930s was the result of foreclosures and distress transfers. In recent years principal repayments have been of Increasing importance. The way in which the debt Increased In-creased and declined in the last three decades, and the conditions affecting af-fecting these movements are discussed dis-cussed by Donald C. Horton in a recent issue of the bureau's publication publica-tion "The Agricultural "Situation." The peak in farm mortgage debt during the last 30 years was in 1922-23, 1922-23, about 172 per cent above the 1910-14 level. The debt has declined in each subsequent year except 1927. The debt increased in all major geographic divisions of the country from 1910 to 1920, and there was a further rise in all areas for some time during the early 1920s. For all geographic decreases liquidation or a much retarded rate of growth followed the increases of the early 1920s, and varying amounts of debt liquidation resulted from the post-1929 post-1929 depression in all areas. Marked regional differences in debt trends occurred in the late 1920s and early 1930s. The continued contin-ued downward trend 'for the west north central states, for example, stood in sharp contrast with the continued con-tinued upward trend for the Pacific states during this period. In the west south central states debt continued con-tinued to increase from 1925 to 1930, whereas in the south Atlantic and east south central states the upward up-ward movement after 1925 continued only to the middle of this five-year period. In four geographic divisions New England, Middle Atlantic, Mountain, and Pacific farm mortgage debt rose for a time after 1930. In all of these regions mortgage debt had either risen or changed little during the latter part of the 1920s. During 1932 and 1933 the decline was general for all areas, but in the following two years there were again widely divergent regional movements. There was a continued rise in New England during the years 1936, 1937 and 1938. Changes were small during this period in the middle Atlantic, east south eentral and Pacific states. There was a considerable decrease, de-crease, however, in the west north central states. The largest decrease for any state in 1938 was 9.4 per cent for North Dakota, the largest increase was 3 per cent for Massachusetts. |