Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 169, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 July 1918 — Keeping Books Aids Farmer in Ascertaining What Part of Living Comes From Farm [ARTICLE]

Keeping Books Aids Farmer in Ascertaining What Part of Living Comes From Farm

(By the United States Department of Agriculture.) How many people know just what it costs them to live? Such information is extremely valuable, especially if the makeup of the cost is known, both as to money cost and the other factors. To the farmer such data should prove valuable, indeed, especially in determining what part of his living comes from the farm. If the accounts have been completely kept, the household expenses are easily assembled from ttye cash record, inventory and record of supplies used. Nothing in the realm of figures is more likely to astonish the average farm family than a summary of the household costs. The farm furnishes the family a house to live in. milk, butter, cream, eggs, pork, fowls, fuel, vegetables and fruit, and often a great many other things. Yet the farmer often does not think of all these unless they are set before him. If he breaks pyen on the year he is likely, to think there is no profit in the business when, in fact, he may have been living much better than the average city business man of like education, attainments and capital. AH these things may have to be seen to be believed, but a well-kept set of records, by adequate handling, can be made to show them.