There come every ftow and then periods of popular discussion and even extensive complaint over what is believed to be the excessive cost of food products. Various causes are suggested as the real explanation of what, for a time at least, is regarded as an oppressive condition. Tariff laws, trusts, excessive profits to transportation companies and the retail trade are all points of attack by those who seek to place the responsibility entirely outside of the business and domestic management of the consumer. These complaints come largely from those families that are supported by daily wages earned in manufacturing and commercial establishments. It is often asserted by these wage earners that their compensation is insufficient to meet reasonable living expenses. Whatever may be the facts as to this claim, a generous share of the cost of food is due to factors for which the family is itself responsible. It is fully as important for families of moderate means to understand how to expend money for life's necessities as to be able to increase their earnings. The relation of the cost of foods to their nutritive value has been discussed elsewhere (pp. 226-231). There is much unwise buying of foods that, nutritively speaking, are very expensive, as has been shown.

225. Cost Of Distribution Of Foods

Another consideration of importance is what may be called the business management of the food supply. The cost of prepared food as it reaches the table includes two general items: viz., the money paid for the raw materials and the value of the time and fuel used in preparing and cooking them. Raw food materials may be purchased in two general ways: in supplies sufficient for weeks or months, or in daily or weekly small quantities. The latter method, which is the one generally adopted, and perhaps necessarily by some families, imposes upon the consumer a heavy expense for distribution. The cost to the groceryman for delivering potatoes and apples by the four quarts or peck, beets by the dozen, cabbages by the head, flour and sugar in lots of a few pounds, is heavy, and the consumer pays the bill.

In his report for 1910 the Secretary of Agriculture says that " the distribution of farm products from the farm to the consumer is elaborately organized, considerably involved and complicated, and burdened with costly features." On the basis of elaborate inquiry by his Department and by the Industrial Commission, the following increases in prices from the producer to the consumer were found to exist: -

It is clear that there is a good opportunity through the application of good business methods to lessen these differences.

1 Price paid slaughter houses.

1 Per cent of price paid producer.

226. Economy In Buying Food

A large proportion of homes have storage space where it is possible to hold flour, sugar, vegetables, and fruits in good condition. When this is the case, the families of large villages and small cities, even of large cities, may safely arrange to buy directly from the producer in barrel or bushel lots a winter's supply of potatoes, apples, beets, carrots, and turnips. Flour may be bought by the barrel. Canned goods are cheaper by the case than when sold in single packages. Certain perishable articles like milk are necessarily taken in daily supply. Where refrigerator space is available, a two weeks' supply of butter will keep in good condition. Several families might unite to great advantage in buying supplies. No money can be invested at a higher rate of interest than purchasing certain food materials in considerable bulk.

227. Outside Preparation Expensive

Again, the cash expense of supporting a family is greatly increased through the transfer to outside hands of much of the cooking that was formerly done in the home. Breakfast foods ready for the table instead of the cheaper corn meal, oatmeal, and hominy, that were cooked at home, bread, cake, and other pastry at more than twice the cost of the raw materials, prepared meats and other articles requiring the minimum of home labor, greatly increase the cash expense. It may be argued that cooked food is cheaper than hired help and is even a necessity where help cannot be obtained. Certainly the groceryman and the baker contribute to the ease and comfort of housekeeping, but these purveyors of prepared food must be paid for their services, and heavy cash payments are in this way substituted for home labor.

Many families do not realize how much is paid for the distribution and preparation of food before it comes into the house. One remedy is to buy more largely from the producer. It cannot justly be claimed that the prices he now receives yield him an undue profit. The other remedy is home preparation of food, when this is reasonably possible.