I. Various measures proposed, 307. — II. A more moderate program, 315. — III. Conclusion, 323.

Journal Article Should Economists make Value Judgments? Get access John D. Black John D. Black Harvard University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 67, Issue 2, May 1953, Pages 286–297, https://doi.org/10.2307/1885340 Published: 01 May 1953

Journal Article Rejoinder Get access John D. Black John D. Black Harvard University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 54, Issue 2, February 1940, Pages 316–317, https://doi.org/10.2307/1883339 Published: 01 February 1940

A NY properly balanced account of the agricultural situation at this time must give important place to activities under the Agricultural Adjustment Act, but facts as to the present condition of agriculture, such as those presented by the writer in his article in this REVIEW in January I933, are needed to furnish a perspective for these activities. The former article undertook to describe the condition of agriculture not only as of that date, but also for the pre-depression years of I925-29, in terms of production, prices, income, land values, and mortgage debt.

T HIS is not an appropriate time for entering into refinements in describing the agricultural situation. The essential facts in it are of such striking character that the details can largely be ignored. What is needed instead is a reasonable interpretation of the outstanding facts. That such an interpretation is not easy to make is emphasized by two divergent interpretations. A Special Committee of the Association of Land-Grant Colleges and Universities, composed of three Deans or Directors and three farm economists, after reviewing the facts in the case concluded as follows: In I927, the agricultural situation was characterized by moderate improvement in prices and income from the postwar collapse of I920-2I, but an unfavorable position in comparison with other groups still persisted.... Evidencing the incomplete recovery, land values were still moving downward, and the net shifts in population were toward the cities, where better opportunities seemed to prevail.... Even though all other groups have experienced reduced income (since then), the farmers' share of the national income in 1930 and I93I has been lower than in any preceding year, and the farmers' rewards for labor, management, and capital, have been placed on a still lower plane in relation to the returns of other groups. The report then affirms that restoration of agricultural prosperity is vital to the welfare of the nation and urges that a comprehensive program of relief be undertaken, even including improving prices of farm products through special price raising measures.' On the other hand, Dr. Joseph S. Davis of the Food Research Institute, who has given much attention to agriculture in the past ten years, in a paper before the American Farm Economic Association in Cincinnati in December, questions whether general disparity between prices of farm products and other prices has been proved, or that special price raising measures to correct such alleged disparities are needed or desirable.2 Surely it will not be easy to evaluate a situation lending itself to such divergent interpretations; and I shall not expect to accomplish this to the satisfaction of the parties named. The elements in the situation to be considered are production, prices, income, population, land values, and mortgage debt.

SINCE the first business survey was made in Tompkins County, New York, in I907 by Cornell University, well over eighty thousand business records have been taken in a total of something like 550 different areas in 45 different states in the United States. Mr. H. W. Hawthorne of the United States Bureau of Agricultural Economics assembled the principal facts for 7 I,55 I of these records in Table 652 (pp. I 285-I3II) in the I925 Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture. Since then, he has secured reports of about five thousand more records taken in fifty additional areas, and all the I927 reports are not yet in. It usually takes a year or more to work up the data of such surveys. In addition, there have been several thousands of other records taken in which data have been obtained with a somewhat different use in mind; for example, the progress records taken of settlers in cut-over or reclaimed areas, the progress records of groups of Southern farmers, the records of family living in which is obtained as a check against expenditures. Each of the business records contains an opening and closing inventory and a record of the receipts and expenditures of the year. From these are computed a farm income figure, and a labor income figure, the latter being the estimate resulting from an attempt to determine the return to the proprietor after a reasonable allowance for interest on investment has been deducted. No other industry has available such a large supply of data collected by educational and governmental agencies with avowedly scientific intent. It is not strange, therefore, that most of those interested in estimating the of agriculture have turned to these survey reports as an important source of data. Data from these surveys figured in the findings of the Commission of Agricultural Inquiry,' in the estimates of incomes by the National Bureau of Economic Research,2 and indirectly in the reports of the National Industrial Conference Board and the Business Men's Commission. Workers in the general field of economics are constantly drawing upon these data of income. It is therefore highly desirable that we have a clear idea of their meaning and applicability.

Reviews the book " Elements of Land Economics," by Richard T. Ely and Edward W. Morehouse.