Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 84.djvu/257

Rh his labor as a drayman as he formerly got for his labor and capital, he is likely to move to town and put his money at interest, thus increasing his annual income. A young man in the country after gaining an amount of schooling is ready to offer his services for sale. Where is the best market? In the majority of cases he finds that it is in the city. He follows the job.

The steady and rapid drift of agricultural population to cities implies the economic dominance of the occupations of cities. If the population of cities tends to outstrip that of the country, it is evident that wealth is relatively increasing rapidly in cities. Where wealth is there will men gather. No amount of exhortation or solicitation will avail to turn the tide countryward if the wealth pull is toward the city.

But is the economic dominance of the city and the suction of life out of the agricultural areas normal and legitimate or unnatural and sinister? Should we make up our minds to the steady continuance of the cityward movement or set our faces against it? What is the rationale of the matter?

In this connection perhaps the truest light comes from noting a somewhat overlooked fact in regard to modern tendencies in consumption. The things we buy are increasingly those of the city rather than of the farm. A smaller and smaller percentage of income is being spent for forms of goods associated with the farm. As standards of living improve there arises an ever-increasing demand for things the farm has little or nothing to do with, such as professional services, classes of manufactured articles, and recreations.

Suppose, for example, that a family with an income of $2,000 suddenly acquired a $4,000 income. Would the farm receive a larger sum, provided the whole income were spent on living? Would this family buy more eggs, potatoes or apples? Possibly a little more. But would not practically all of the increase of income go for the goods of the city? Suppose a man inherited a million dollars and set out to spend it. How much more would he spend in which the farmer would directly share? Even in hypothetical expenditures for rare wines and fifty-cent cigars the grape grower and the tobacco raiser would share but faintly, for manufacturing and distributing processes would absorb the lion's share of the retail price. And as for automobiles, grand pianos, works of art, travel and operations for appendicitis, city occupations would be the almost exclusive beneficiaries.

With increase of purchasing power the prosperous consumer wants but little if any more of direct farm products, while his desires for other values soar. Agricultural products cater to a low range of fixed wants, while non-agricultural goods satisfy wants which are ever in advance of power to purchase and are virtually without limit. The wants satisfied by agricultural products may be thought of as occupying the space between parallel lines, while the wants satisfied by