The Condition of Farm Workers in 1957

SHE CONDITION OF FARM WORKERS IN 1957 REPORT TO THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF NATIONAL SHARECROPPERS FUND, INC. By Fay Bennett, Executive Secretary The year 1957 ended with great suffering for thousands of migrant and share¬ cropper families in different parts of the United States. Crop freezes in Florida brought reports like this: ". . .Whole families are forced to live in the open. . .Many are making homes in cardboard and any other kind of makeshift shacks in the woods..." — Miami Daily News (February 22, 1958) Floods followed by a cold wave brought this to Tennessee: "...Literally thousands of farm families in the 'Mississippi bottoms' area actually are hungry and facing starvation unless help comes quickly..." — Atlanta Journal-Constitution (January 12, 1958) No weather problems but just the ordinary situation for migrants in California is told here: "...Longest slum in the world. . .village conditions in Pakistan no worse than some of the California camps. . .migratory families living under conditions similar to refugees in Seoul (Korea)..." --San Jose Mercury (January 23, 1958) A freeze or flood serves to underscore the fact that most farm worker families are so low on the economic scale that few have reserves to meet emergencies. THE AMERICAN FARM The estimated farm population in April, 1957, was 20,396,000 persons, a drop of over 1 million in a year and a decrease of 4,662,000 since 1950. A clear¬ er picture can be obtained from a division of farms according to the dollar value of their output. Of the almost 5 million farms in the U. S. according to the 1954 census, 3% — 134,000 — produce 31.3% of the output and utilize 22.4% of the farm acreage. It is estimated that these 134,000 farms employ more than 20% of the approxi¬ mately 2 million domestic farm workers and the great bulk of the 466,000 imported contract workers. These are the farms whose output adds up to the surpluses the federal subsidy program is supposed to curtail. The surplus is not increased significantly by the 1 million small farmers — more than 1/3 of all commercial farms — whose gross income is less than $2,500. Yet govern¬ ment programs, working against themselves, continue to favor the 134,000. FAMILY FARMS FACE CRISIS As thoughtful people become increasingly concerned with the equation of big¬ ness in industrial life with the growth toward conformity, attention may well be focused upon the American family farmer who through the decades has repre¬ sented freedom. Owning his own land and self-employed, the farmer has been free to speak as he believed. But, in order to make use of mechanization and improved farming methods, a successful farm must have sufficient acreage and capital. The availability of credit at reasonable interest rates and other government policies play a vital role in determining whether the family farmer will stay in business or be displaced by the giant corporation farms. Here is how the pattern of government policies emerges: Total federal farm expenditures for all farm programs including subsidy payments were about 5 billion dollars last year. About 2 billion dollars were spent directly for stabilizing farm prices. Over 500 million dollars went in direct cash payments under the soil bank program, paid largely to corporation farms. Over 1/4 million dollars ($278,187.38) was paid to just one farmer under the latter program. These sums contrast sharply with the $342.5 million spent by the Farmers Home Administration in its loan program for the year on behalf of small