As Teacher’s and Bricklayer’s Lets Improve, Taxes Cost Far More Thao Food:
Elmer D. Hawbaker, Penn
sylvania Senate minority leader,
spoke here this week about how
lood prices get cheaper and
cheaper for the consumer.
At the annual banquet meeting
ol the Lancaster County DHIA at
the Farm and Home Center
Tuesday, Hawbaker recalled that
m 1941 he produced chickens and
sold them for 30 cents a pound
live with “feathers and all.” “in
those days,” he added, “having
chicken meant cutting the head
off and plucking the feathers.”
But consumers today often
don’t even pay 30 cents a pound to
buy the chicken cooked and ready
to eat, he stated.
This isn’t the only farm com
modity with which this sort of
thing has happened, Hawbaker
noted.
In 1949, he recalls selling a pen
oi hogs and receiving $29.50 a
hundredweight. More than 20
years later hogs are selling for
less at a time with the working
man “insists on 12 per cent an
nual increases in salary to keep
up with the inflation.”
“How does he (the working
man) think the lamer is getting
rich with declining prices?”
Hawbaker asked.
Noting that his wife is a school
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Senator Tells How Food Is Very Good Buy
teacher, Hawbaker said she
earns about 13 times the salary
that she did when he met her m
1937. He said that milk at that
time was selling for 10 cents a
quart. If farmers had gotten the
same rate of increases as his
wife, milk would be selling for
$1.30 a quart today instead of the
37 cents or less that it ’is,
Hawbaker said.
And the farmer would be
getting something like $26 a
hundred for his milk instead of $6,
Hawbaker said. Hawbaker
operates an 80-cow milking herd
in Franklin County.
He said he joked recently with
his wife that if he had gotten the
same kind of raises over the
years that she has, he could also
work 180 days and loaf 185.
He admitted that he was
somewhat facetious in making
the comment. He acknowledged
that “teachers have it hard,” but
also emphasized that “the far
mer has a hard job, too.” He
mentioned the need to get the
cows milked in all kinds of
weather, including zero weather,
throughout the year
Hawbaker also spoke about the
increasing bargain consumers
are getting in food, but he played
down the effect of “middle men”
S I
UP
LANCASTER WILLOW STREET STRASBURG
397-4733 464-3421 687-7617
IKje. Firs*
Tlotiorul (bank
Ojjf MEMBER F.D.I.C.
Senator Elmer Hawbaker, left, is greeted Tuesday afternoon. Hawbaker was the
by Donald Eby, president of the Lancaster banquet speaker.
County DHIA, at the annual DHIA banquet
Lancaster Farming, Saturday, January 22.1972
in causing higher lood costs
There used to be a lot of talk
about middle men getting all the
larmcr’s profits, but there's
much less ol this talk today as
larmers become much more
lamihar with business in general,
he said
He recalled that he found out
from cxpierence with his own
bottling operations about
“middle men’s costs ” The big
gap between I arm prices and
consumer prices is eaten up
mostly by costs rather than
prolits, he stated
Hawbaker also said that 70
years ago in 1900 the average
working man had to spend 30
minutes ol labor to earn a quart
ol milk Today he works lour and
one hall minutes for the same
quart of milk
Hawbaker emphasized that
“price doesn’t mean anything
today” becuase the values ol the
dollar changes. “The thing that’s
basic is time the amount ol time
that a worker must snend in
order to earn something.”
“We are supplying each other’s
needs with the work we do,”
according to Hawbaker
The state Senator also noted
that while the average worker
spends 13 hours and 15 minutes ol
work per week to pay his taxes,
he spends only live hours and 15
minutes to buy his lood Clothing
costs him two hours and live
minutes a week, medical ex
penses one hour and 15 minutes,
and recreation one hour and 35
minutes “It certainly points out
that lood is not a burden lor most
lamihes "
At the same time that the
amount ol work necessary to buy
lood is declining, the lood itsell is
coming in better lorm note the
example of chicken
Despite these tacts the /armer
is under increasing pressure
Irom consumers, Hawbaker
noted “Wo even have a
Secretary ol Agriculture to en
courage Pennsylvanians to drive
across the river into New Jersey
to buy milk The thing that we
and the Secretary should be
saying is this Food today is
cheaper than it has been
anywhere else in the world ”
Hawbaker also recalled that
the income Irom “one bushel ol
(Continued on Page 11)
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