The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, March 2, 1916, Page 8

{i ? Bt s ) m o 3 ot iR S it i AT EIGHT There is in North Dakota, let us say, a farmer by the name of John Smith and another by the name of Ole Anderson. Each after harvest hauls a load of 6000 pounds of wheat to town. John Smith’s wheat grades No. 1 Northern subject to dockage of 2.51 per cent. Ole Anderson’s ‘wheat grades “rejected”, with 138.96 per cent of screenings. John Smith, with 2.51 per cent of screenings, would have a dockage of 155.6 pounds. This, taken from his 6000 pounds, would give him 5844.4 pounds of wheat, the actual weight of which is 61.12 pounds per bushel; or, as sold at 60 pounds per bushel, he would have 97.5 bushels (5844.4 divid- ed by 60). This wheat, let us say, is quoted at $1.17 per bushel. For his 97.5 bushels, therefore, John Smith would receive $114.07 (97.5 multiplied by $1.17). ° Case of Ole Ole Anderson, on the other hand, with his 6000 pounds of “rejected” wheat, is subject to dockage of 13.96 per cent and he would therefore stand 837.6 pounds dockage, leaving him 5162.4 pounds of grain. This would be equivalent to 86 bushels of wheat (5162.4 divided by 60). - As the price for “rejected” would be $1.048 at the time John Smith’s No. 1 was worth $1.17, Ole Anderson would receive - $90.128 for his load (86 multiplied by $1.084). : These are mnot real farmers, of course, but they are typical of thous- ands in North Dakota and the figures and conditions stated are given in. a bulletin of the North Dakota Agricul- tural Experiment station by Food Commissioner E. F. Ladd, just issued. - Did Ole Anderson and John Smith get a fair deal in what might well have been an actual transaction under g'resent .grading -and dockage rules? o find out if they did-it is necessary to trace to the mill that wheat they sold and ascertain how much flour and by-products were obtained from it and what the values of these finished pro- ducts were. The bulletin does so trace these two loads of wheat, as follows: Ik John’s Wheat Tested Tests made under the direction of Commissioner Ladd show with scien- tific accuracy that John Smith’s 6000 pounds of wheat, graded No. 1 North- ern, would produce as follows: Screenings 155.6 1bs. Flour, straight 3935.08 ” Wheat bran 953.18 ” Shorts 875.36, ” Loss in milling 61.36 ” . The amount received for these fin- ished products from John Smith’s wheat would have been as follows, un- der prices prevailing when John Smith received $1.17 for his No. 1 Northern: Flour $113.329 Bran 9.5632 Shorts 10.942 Screenings 933 $134.736 John Smith got $114.07 for his wheat, as we have seen. The mill transformed it and got $134.73 for it. Ole’s Wheat Tested 1\{ow what happened to Ole Ander- son’s 6000 pounds of “rejected”? His load would produce as follows: 'Screemngs‘ 837.60 lbs. Flour, straight " 32874 ” Wheat bran 962.27 ” Shorts 845.16 Loss in milling 17.65 ” The mill would receive for these products, at prices current when Ole - THE, NONPARTISAN LEADER Commissioner Ladd Issues Another Bulletin on Grading and Docking of Grain---Powerful Indictment of Present System Results from Years of Study and Hundreds of Tests---Poorer Grades of Wheat Give Mill Best Return Anderson got $1.048 for his wheat, the following amounts: Flour $94.677 Bran 9.622 Shorts 10.564 Screenings 5.025 $119.888 Therefore, for the wheat for which Ole Anderson received $90:12 the mill received $119.88, after transforming it into finished products. Putting the two transactions side by side it looks _ like this: Received Received by producer by the mill Smith’s ; ; wheat $114.07 $134.73 Anderson’s wheat - 90.12 119.88 From the above figures it appears that the cost of milling, other charges - Shows Grading Unfair FOOD COMMISSIONER E. - F. LADD; who now also will be president of the State Agricultural Collegé’ at Fargo, author of investigation and’ “report on wheat grading rules and dockagg.- p and profit, which is the difference be- tween what the producer and the mill received for it, is in the case of John Smith’s wheat 18 per cent and the case of Ole Anderson’s wheat 33 per cent. If 18 per cent is a fair charge for marketing and milling on No. 1 Nor- thern wheat, why does it cost 33 per cent to market and mill “rejected” wheat? -If John Smith got a fair price for his wheat considering what the mill got for it after transforming it, Ole Anderson got badly stung. John Smith had to stand only 18 per cent loss between him and the consumer; Ole Anderson had to stand a 33 per cent loss. Who gets this difference between 18 and 33 per cent in the cost of market- ing and milling these two grades of wheat and why doesn’t it go to Ole Anderson, who is entitled to it? These facts and questions consti- tute a powerful indictment of the present rules for grading grain. If a fair profit is being made by middle- men and millers on No. 1 Northern “wheat, the farmers are being robbed on “rejected” wheat. Other Facts Given = But this comparison of John Smith’s and Ole Anderson’s wheat is only one given by Commissioner Ladd’s new bulletin on grading of wheat. This latest bulletin is the result of eight years of study and experiment on the wheat of North Dakota. The experi- ment station gives the results of the milling of over 600 samples of all grades and classes of wheat. Each sample was milled and the value of the flour and by-products obtained. The flour obtained was baked into bread in each case. -The value of the flour obtained from each sample was ascertained and the mill by-products valued and analyzed. The result is a mass of facts, scientifically accurate, that condemn the present grading rules and show that under them the farmers of North Dakota are loosing millions of dollars annually. The farmers of North Dakota are docked for their screenings. Not -only that. They pay the freight on them to the terminal market. Com- missioner Ladd ascertained that on the average 38.99 per cent of the wheat as it_comes to the local elevator is sereenings. He tested 652 samples from 1907 to the close of 1914 to get at that big fact. Screenings are shrunken and broken kernels of wheat, dirt, weed seed, wild oats, etc. The wheat crop of North Dakota averages 100,000,000 bushels and from this, Commissioner Ladd finds, the farmers are docked 239,400,000 pounds or 119,- 700 tons annually, and they pay the _ freight on these 119,700 tons of screen- ings to the terminal market each year. { . Screenings a Gold Mine { Commissioner Ladd’s analyses of screenings show them to be a valuable stock food, sold back to the farmer at $20 ‘a ton, after he has given them away, - through - dockage, -with his wheat. At $20 a ton the screenings given away by the farmers under the present * dockage -rules amount to $2,394,000 on: one. crop. The screen- ings are jobbed at $12to $15'a ton by the millers; . . . B ! Commissioner Ladd summarizes the eight-years of- experiments by apply- . ing the facts obtained. to.show exact- “»ly what- the farmer gets for each grade of wheat and what the finished product from each grade sells for. In other words he has ascertained mil- ling: and -marketing .costs for .60,000 pounds of each grade, or 1000 bushels. The result is as follows: Grade of wheat Cost of wheat No. 1 Northern $1016.70 No. 2 Northern 984.70 No. 3 Northern 966.30 No. 4 Northern 909.20 “Rejected” 853.10 In the case of each grade the figur- es used are for 60,000 pounds or 1000 bushels of wheat. Gain on Each Shown Commissioner Ladd then shows by per centages, figured from the above data, what the gain is between the price the farmer receives for his wheat and the cFrice the mill receives for the finished products made from that wheat, as follows: Difference between Grade what farmer gets and of wheat price of mill products No. 1 Northern 24.84 per cent No. 2 Northern 27.39 per cent No. 3 Northern 30.59 per cent No. 4 Northern . 35.85 per cent “Rejected” 47.13 per cent This means that grades No. 3 and 4 and “rejected” are the most profit- : TR AT Ny T el WHO PAYS THE TAXES ? Tax Commission Shows Per Centage Farmers Dig Up Each Year There has been much discussion as to the proportionate tax of the state aid outside of cities and villages. he tax commission has completed a compilation for 1918 of all the taxes paid in 224 incorporated cities, towns and villages within the state. It is found that the assessed valu- ation of these cities for 1913 was $46,605,764; the total assessed valu- ation for that year was $302,729,657. In other words, 84.7 per cent of all the assessed valuation in the state is to be found outside ‘of cities, towns and villages. The remaining 15.3 per._cent is found within these cities, towns and villages. The total tax for 1913 for all pur- " poses, state and local, was $12,888,753. Of this amount these cities, towns and villages paid: $3,490,461, or 27 per cent of the total.. Outside of: these cities, towns and villages the country district paid $9,398,292 or 73 per:cent. -The difference in the ratio between the assesed value and the tax is due to the high valuations and the high rates in the larger cities and towns in the state. = It is probable that the ratio for the country for 1915 will be consider- able more owing to the large percent- age of the increased assessment fal- ling upon acre property. USUALLY theloudest howler that “the farmers can’t stick together” is :the crooked politician. = Well, there is one thing certain, the farmers are not “going to stick” to the crooked’ and professional politician this year, = THANK RAILROAD COMMISSION Pekin Farmers Condemn Anti-Farmer Newspapers. _The farmers in the vicinity of Pe- , N. D., in a body assembled do }t\iereby make - the following resolu- ons: d Whereas, The railroad commission- ers in a recent meeting in Fargo, N. D,, have again shown their. willing- ness to let the farmers, to some ex- tent, control the marketing of their products, we hand them our hearty_ ; and i ‘Whereas, The Equity committee headed by J. G. Crites if Lisbon, N D, have done such good work in be- If of the free market, we do here- by ' express our appreciation of their ‘efforts; and Whereas, We recognize that a great able for milling ‘under _the present grading rules, despite the factithat. these grades return the farmer' suh- stantially less. ‘It means that if the millers are receiving a fair profit for converting No. 1 wheat, and. they must be, that farmers are being.rob- bed on all other grades. Official re- ports at the terminal market show that only 28.3 per cent of thg' w_'heat* received is graded No. 1. This is an average for two years. Assuming a fair price is paid for this, it results that the remainder, or 71.7 per cent of the wheat crop, is .purchased f}'om the farmers at unfairly low prices, due to the obsolete grading rules, which fail to recoginze the fact that, while the farmer gets less for his 80- called poorer grades of wheat, the mill profit is much greater, nearly double sometimes, on these so called poorer grades =5 . The cost to the grain producers of this injustice amounts to millions of dollars a year and is in addition to the loss to him and the profit to the mill on the dockage. Commissioner Ladd summarizes the situation thus: System Denounced “It will readily be observed that for each expenditure of $1016.70 for grade No. 1 there is a gain of $251.43; or the gain for the transforming of the wheat into flour has been $251.43; and for the lowest expenditure of $853.10, a gain of $402.04. In other words, then, assuming that the profits are reasonably fair for the best grade of wheat, there is_a much larger profit for milling and-selling the rejected and lower grades of wheat. In other words, again, as we have pointed out in a previous bulletin, it would seem that the present system of grading wheat can hardly be classed as equit- able under market conditions for mill products as they now prevail. - “The average receipts for the five grades above (on 1000 bushels) would be $1255.09. In other words, the re- ceipts for the rejected wheat were greater than the general average by 5 cents; and grade No. 1 was greater by only $13.04, while grade No. 2 was 3 -cents above the general average. The percentage gained on ¥e; wheat was nearly twice that for grade No. 1 Northern. The average cost for each 1000 bushels ¢f wheat (taking an equal amount of each grade) is $946, average receipts $1255.09, average ' gain $309.09, or an average profit of" 32.67 per cent. Grading Inequitable “If we assume that there-was a reasonable profit in milling. No. 1 Northern wheat, then the profit is out of all proportion for No. 4 and reject- - ed grades, and therefore the is not equitable for ' all classes of wheat. On the other hand, if we as- sume that the profits for milling. as shown by the average of all grades Received for mill product Difference $1268.13 $261.43 1255.12 270.42 1261.91 295.61 1235.15 825.95 1255.14 402.04 were just, then we must admit that- the system of grading is not equitable and that there should be a readjusting so that producers of all grades may receive a fair compensation. “But this assumption is hardly probable, for the bulk of the wheat grades, in most years, No. 1 and No. 2 Northern, and the millers handling these grades are, apparently, doing a profitable business. “It would seem, therefore, that we would be justified in concluding that: the present system of grading wheat is not equitable, and that the differ- ence between No. 1 and No. 4 and re- Jjected is too large a margin, and the farmer whose wheat grades low does not receive a fair compensation in proportion to its true value for milling purposes.” y deal of the public press throughbut : the state, if not openly oppose, to a great extent do not publislfgvha% may be favorable to the farmers’ inter- ests, we pledge ourselves not to sup-. port such papers, and urge that our brother farmers in the state.do like- ‘wise. Resolved that a copy of these reso- = lutions be sent to an printed in the = = Pekin Budget, the Cooperators’ Her- ald, the Nonpartisan Leader, and such =~ other papers that may be intedested. Pekin, N. D., Feb. 23,y 1916. J. L. Morken, President. ' G - O. C. Enstad, Secretary. THE biggest: asset-tfl : North Dakg‘.a can ha ¥ in them_sel_ves and thei et i . o S o 4 1 ey can accomplish mo any thing for their goqd.’p mosk i ‘cause, ~When | 4 Ole and John Sell Wheat and Ole Gets Stung a4 < <