WILL BREAD BE ANY CHEAPER?
Anderson, Douglas
Will Bread Be Any Cheaper? Price of Wheat To Farmers Lowered by 80 cents Per Bushel; Is This Amount to be Given to The Millers or Will Difference Be Shown in Price or Size of Loaves? By DOUGLAS...
...If they are a 12-ounce loaf at 5 cents will be a reality, and a pound loaf at ten cento will not be tolerated...
...Tho answer to that question will determine whether or not control of the price of wheat by the government is to prove of any value to the American people for unless it is roflected in tho price of bread, government price control will have proven a failure...
...Investigations show" says Dr...
...Price fixing should not stop with the farmer however...
...8.92 $3.98 A 12-ornce loaf sold at 5 cents would leave a margin of $8.33 on each barrel of flour to cover cost of baking and profit to 'he miller and the baker as follows: 343 loaves at 3 cents...
...wheat at $2.11...
...2.10 Less cost of flour...
...If the millers and the bakers are to be allowed to extract $17.1S for translating a barrel of flour that costs $8.92 to produce, into 261 pound loaves of bread, then control of the price of wheat by the government will mean nothing to the people, who must buy bread...
...at 16-oz...
...8.33 A 16-ounce loaf to be sold at 10 cents will produce a margin to cover cost of baking and profits to the millers and the bakers of a sum on each barrel of flour more than twice as large as the actual cost of the flour itself, or $17.18, as follows: 201 loaves at 10 cents...
...14.90 $8.92 $5.98 345 12-oz...
...Ladd proceeds to prove that a 14 ounce loaf at 5 cents is possible, a 12 ounce loaf at 5 cents would leave more than an ample margin of profit for the miller, and the baker, while to continue to sell a pound loaf at 10 cennts is to subject the people of this country to a species of extortion for the benefit of the milling interests and the bakers, for which there is no justification or excuse...
...The milling combine and the Master Bakers Associations must be subjected to the same treatment as the farmer...
...at 0.2-oz...
...9.50 Milling cost...
...It must continue until the loaf of bread reaches the table of the ultimate consumer...
...8.92 $17.18 Some Other Considerations THE figures used are extremely conservative, as no allowance is made for a difference of 13 cents a barrel in the cost of wheat at Minneapolis, where the great bulk of the flour is manufactured, nor for the fact that the flour used by bakers is what is commonly known as "bakers patents," and is sold at a lower figure than the average, which was used in figuring the cost at $8.92 a barrel...
...He believes that the democratic party should pass the constitutional amendment for suffrage now before congress...
...4 Northern, and tho price for that grade at Chicago' is $2.11, the figure used above...
...26.10 8.92 17.13 14-oz...
...The following day a statement was given out that a 16 ounce loaf at ten cents was the best the consumer might expect with the price of wheat fixed at $2.20 a bushel...
...8.92 8.92 8.92 Cost of baking and profit to miller and baker...
...By DOUGLAS ANDERSON THE government, through its food administration department, has told the farmer how much he is to receive for his wheat...
...Malone, in his statement, cited that he liad campaigned in the west for the election of President WTilson but he feels that the promises made by the administration in that campaign with respect to suffrage have not been kept...
...The price and the size of the loaf of bread, which is to bo sold to the people, is, according to present indications, to be determined by the milling interests and the bakers...
...8.92 - Profit div ided between miller and baker on each b WHO GETS THE MONEY...
...Should this prove to be true then the net effect of the control of the price of wheat by the government will be the toss of hundreds of millions of dollars to the farmers, no relief to the great mass of the people, who buy bread, and the pocket-ting of hundreds of millions of profits by the various agencies which stand between the farmer and the man who buys a loaf of bread...
...17.23 Less cost of flour...
...Malone believes that the treatment accorded the pickets in Washington has been in violation of all constitutional rights...
...It was announced that the profit of the millers was to be limited to 25 cents a barrel, but the cost of flour tc the consumer is not to be regulated...
...That will allow nearly 100 per cent of the actual cost of a barrel of flour ($S.92) to be divided between the miller and the baker...
...With flour costing $8.92 a barrel Dr...
...Thus far .he only price that has been fixed is that of wheat...
...One thing is certain beyond the question of a dpubt...
...This is that a 12 ounce loaf can easily be produced for 5 cents, provided the millers and the bakers do not make any more profit on their flour and bread than the farmer is making on his wheat," Dr...
...loaves at 5c...
...Nor is there to bo any action regulating the price of bread...
...17.25 8.92 8.33 261 16-oz...
...loaves per barrel...
...5.98 $8.33 $17.18 The price of $2.20 a bushel is for the highest grade, No...
...1.23 Total cost...
...298 345 261 Total received...................$14.90 $17.25 $26.10 Less cost of flour...
...In a statement given out following the decision of the committee, he says: "In fixing $2.20 as the basic price for wheat at Chicago, the committee did so with the full belief, from data which it had, that this would allow the production of a 14 ounce loaf of bread for 5 cents...
...No Justice In Charge THAT there is no justification for a charge of 10 cents for a pound loaf of bread with wheat at $2.20 a bushel is the conclusion of Dr...
...Ladd "that a barrel of flour will make 261 full pound loaves, 298 14-ounce loaves, or 345 12-ounce loaves...
...E. F. Ladd, President of the North Dakota Agricultural College, and a member of the wheat price fixing board...
...According to the figures presented by Professor Ladd, the least the American people have a right to expect is a 12 ounce loaf at 5 cents or a 24 ounce loaf at 10 cents...
...Will that loss be pocketed by the Milling interests, the railroads, and the bakers, or will it be reflected in a reduction in tho price of bread...
...A 14-ounce loaf sold at 5 cents would leave a margin on each barrel of flour of $5.98 to cover cost of baking, and profit to the miller and the baker as follows: 298 loaves at 5 cents....$14.00 Less cost of flour...
...That is exactly what will happen, if bakers are to be permitted to sell a pound loaf at ten cents...
...Immediately following the firing or the price of wheat, it was intimated in press dispatches from Washington that the price fixed for wheat would make possible a 14 ounce loaf of bread at 5 cents...
...1 Northern, but very little wheat grades are as high as that...
...loaves at 10c...
...67...
...The average of all wheat milled is about No...
...The cost at Minneapolis is 3 cents a bushel less, so that the cost of a barrel of flour would be 13 cents less, when manufactured at a Minneapolis mill...
...10.17 Less value of by products...
...Less cast baker on of flotrr each barrel 298 14-oz...
...The prico of wheat to tho American farmer has been fixed—a price which represents a reduction of approximately 80 cents a bushel over the prevailing market the day the government price went into effect...
...The government has stepped in and fixed the price of wheat to the farmer at a figure, which is now claimed to be below the cost of production in many states this year...
...8.92 MALONE IN PROTEST DUDLEY FIELD MALONE, collector of the port of New York, recently resigned his position as a protest against the stand on suffrage of the present administration...
...At least this was the understanding of many of the members of the wheat price-fixing board, when the $2.20 rate per bushel for wheat was fixed...
...Ladd has made extensive investigations of the milling industry, and is recognized as one of the leading authorities on the subject...
...This is to be left to competition, as is shown in the following telegram sent by Herbert Hoover to A. Lorenz, secretary of a Minneapolis labor union on August 26 last: "There is no intention of riving the priceon floor, as we feel that this will be adjusted by competitive operations...
...at 5c 5c 10c No...
...He contends that the actual cost of a barrel of flour at the price fixed for Wheat is less than $9.00 a barrel, divided as follows: 41/2 bu...
...The reduction in the price of wheat from $3.06 to $2.20 a bushel meant a loss of hundreds of millions to the farmers of the country...
...loaves at 5c...
Vol. 9 • September 1917 • No. 9
