The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, July 8, 1918, Page 3

; stand each' other. ~,committees fix prices on “the monopolists and - . toslip under the buying X avallable 'supply fand to’ In the interest of a square deal for the farmers ’ Tonpartisin Teader Oflicifil Magazine of the National Nonpartisfin League A magazine that dares to print the truth VOL. 7, NO. 1 ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA, JULY 8, 1918 WHOLE NUMBER, 146 Who Gets Rich Off Butter and Eggs? Government Investigation Shows Clearly That the Farmer Gets the CONDITIONS in the buying and -selling of grain and pack- ing products™in the gigantic game of the wheat gamblers and the packing trust—are not sufficient to convince one that the farmer is the victim of a closed system, that the markets are monopohzed by a combina- tion of mlddlemen and prices-are fixed to pro- ducers and consumers, a little excursion into the butter and egg market ought to prove it. Here a series of government investigations be- ginning in 1910 and continuing at intervals right up to date, supplemented by affidavits signed by — men on the inside, proves conclusively the existence’ of an absolute monopoly under which supply and demand has about as much effect on prices as the tides;, and where raising products has about as much to do with making money as raising prices has to do with feeding the nation. Here, as in évery other line of farm produce, farmers raise crops and get a lot of work and expenence out of it; monopolists and speculators raise prices and make the real money out of the industry. WHAT THE FEDERAL INVESTIGATORS PROVED Government investigations begummg' in 1910 re- veal the following facts concemmg the butter and egg market: - 1. The butter market and 650 per cent of the egg market is controlled- and manipulated by the Chicago Butter -and Egg board and the Elgin Board of Trade of Elgin, Il 2. These Chicago and Elgin monopolies are more or less connected with each other, “many of the same individuals being interested in both. 3. The packing trust now controls 50 per cent of the egg market and is rapidly mvadmg the butter market with its artificial substitutes for butter. 4.. All these above in- terests are more or less connected and under- 5. The Chicago: Butter and Egg board and the . Elgin Board of Trade fix the. price of butter and eggs to the farmer and to the consumer through- out’ the United States through : their quotation committees, making the price as low as practica- ble 'to the farmers and as high as possible to-the’ consumers. 6. They fix these prices by means of a senes of gamblmg sales in imag- inary or “future” butter and egg deliveries in vio- ' lation and deflance of | the. law. S 7 These quotatlon: 3 a ‘fictitious basis to the general public enabling * speculators on the inside public and grab the ruin the market for to break up the power of these boards and stop their plundering and illegal transactions were suc- cessfully circumvented by secret deals and under- standings of all kinds. After investigating, the government found that 24 individuals or firms controlled the butter supply in Chicago, buying the butter at artificially de- pressed prices and selling it throughout the states at monopoly prices. ROB BOTH THE FARMER AND HOUSEWIFE How this works is explained by E. L. Adams, an independent. butter dealer, in an affidavit signed January 19, 1912: “The Chlcago Butter and Egg board robs both farmers and consumers. It has 100 members. They represent 90 per cent of the butter dealers of Chicago. - And there is a committee of nine chosen from these members, who meet on fixed dates and set the price of butter at whatever price they wish. Usually this figure is below the legitimate quota- tions of the market. “Armed with their own quotation, the Chicago Butter and Egg board sallies into the dairy dis- tricts and buys the commodity at that price. Then when the members have the shipment safe in their hands, they have another meeting, raise the quota- tion above the legitimate one, and sell to the whole- salers. “Most of the butter that the board is quoting today at 40 and 41 cents a pound was bought from the farmer at around 36 cents a pound last week. The latter price was below the actual selling price at that time. The wholesaler sells it to the grocer for 43 or 44 cents. the pound, and when the housewife comes to buy it she pays something like 50 to 52 cents, and the farmer sold it for 36 cents.” A profit of 16 cents a pound to the middlemen The grocer adds 7 or 8 cents to " an American Y ade machirltle pnllmg FrEevnch cannon to: Experlence and the Monopolists and Speculators Take the Profits on all the butter consumed in the United States represents a sum that staggers the imagination. Over a billion pounds of butter is produced on farms alone, not counting the enormous amount made in factories. Out of the hundreds of millions of dollars made yearly by middlemen handling but- ter, a very large proportion is seized by the Chicago and Elgin gamblers who are about as useful in but- ter production and distribution as barnacles: on a ship. Passing butter from producer to consumer is a simple process and requires no raw material, such as feed and forage, land and cattle; no equipment other than transportation and storage facilities and one-tenth the labor necessary to produce milk and manufacture butter; YET, TAKING THE ABOVE ICASE AS TYPICAL, THE MIDDLEMEN GET 16 CENTS OUT OF 52, OR ABOUT HALF AS MUCH AS THE PRODUCER GETS WHOSE SERVICES ARE WORTH 10 TIMES AS MUCH. FARMER GETS JUST ENOUGH TO KEEP RUNNING The individual farmer who produces the milk and sells it or who individually or co-operatively manu- factures the butter, in the vast majority of cases gets in his 86 cents barely enough to cover operat- ing, raw material and labor costs. THE CLOSED MARKET HAS THE POWER TO DEPRIVE HIM OF ALL INDEPENDENT PROFITS ABOVE THESE COSTS. THAT IS JUST EXACTLY WHAT IT EXISTS FOR AND AS LONG AS IT IS PERMITTED TO EXIST THE FARMER WILL CONTINUE TO PUT ALL THE PROFITS IN ITS COFFERS WHILE IT PERMITS HIM TO RE- TAIN ENOUGH TO KEEP HIS PLANT IN GOOD RUNNING ORDER. The government found that the Elgin Board of Trade included 60 or 70 members belonging to the Chicago Butter and Egg board and that the two bodies monopolized the butter and egg market in conjunction with the ; 7 ON TO THE FRONT! . : % ;)ackiné' tru.st, Th;e Elgin body had annual con- tracts on practically the entire: output of Minne- sota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Michigan. Indiana and ter output in these states alone of 650,000,000 pounds. 1912, this ‘combine had butter in cold storage. It not only manipulates: the butter market, but to the same degree it monop~ olizes and mampulabes the egg market. sults of ‘the egg monop- the United States have for eggs to no other end: than to get their eggs in a stale instead of a fresh condition. Eggs are * cornered and stored’ until “big eight,” headed: the death- ~ E. Wetz, had fixed the Illinois—an - annual but- December 186, 117,000,000 pounds of: -One of the lovely - re- oly is that the people of to pay advanced prices - they are stale in order that the consumer shall’ pay a larger price for- them. In November, 1916; it was found' that tbe" e e wrrast o