UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials
Unsigned editorials represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of only the writers.
SEPTEMBER 22,1978
Ruling may open KUAC
The Internal Revenue Service's decision not to tax the University of Kansas Athletic Corporation on broadcasting revenue is good news to those who want to see the KUAC remain on firm financial footing.
The University's contention that broadcasting revenues are an extension of KU's educational mission also is good news—if that means KUAC will no longer hide behind its status as a "corporation" whenever convenient.
THE IRS decided more than a year ago that KUAC, Southern Methodist University, Texas Christian University and the Cotton Bowl Association should be taxed on revenues from broadcast collegiate athletic events.
Had KU's appeal of that decision not been successful—KUAC was told last week it would not have to pay such taxes—KUAC stood to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the decision apparently would have applied nationwide.
But the University successfully argued that broadcasting athletic events is educational and that such broadcasts are merely extensions of selling tickets to events—money that already is tax exempt.
THE "EDUCATIONAL value"
argument admittedly is hard to swallow if one takes education to mean something approximating intellectual development, not sweat, pigskin and crowded stadiums.
KUAC should be reminded of that line of reasoning, however, the next time its status as a corporation is used as an excuse to trample student opinion or hinder public access to KUAC proceedings.
Clyde Walker, former men's athletics director, had the unfortunate habit of using such tactics—calling KUAC a corporation when he wanted to push his programs through without dissent, calling it an extension of the University's educational programs when he wanted to avoid taxes.
SO FAR, BOB Marcum, the new men's athletics director, has lived up to his billing as an administrator who will be open and fair with the public.
His response to a question on KUAC openness at recent Student Senate forum--that he would simply abide by KUAC's "corporate bylaws"—leaves him plenty of official room to maneuver.
We can only hope Marcum will exercise due discretion and live up to the University's statement to the IRS that KUAC is a cut above a purely profit-minded private corporation.
Economic theory says cartels increase profits
To the editor:
While all appearances indicate that Sen. McGovern is a sincere and compassionate man, I would agree with Hick Aml (Daily News) that the president dissolved a capacity for careful thinking.
However, Alm's argument that the failure of McGovenn's proposed wheat cartel could be predicted on the basis of "fundamental economic principles" is fallacious. Alm asserts that while the formation of the oil cartel resulted in increased profits for oil producers, the formation of a wheat cartel would not result in higher profits for oil producers because the demand for wheat is more price elastic than the demand for oil.
Perhaps it is not unreasonable to assume that the world demand curve for wheat is downward sloping—although if Aim would share with the world the basis for his reiterated statement that demand curves "always" slope downward, economists
First of all, it is very unlikely that Alm has any evidence regarding the price elasticity of demand for either product, and it would be appropriate to label Mr. McGovern's proposal as "dammish fool" on the basis of his casual impressions concerning the existence of substitutes for oil
more important, basic economic theory leads to the prediction that formation of a cartel in an industry that was previously competitive will increase profits for that industry even if demand is highly price elastic. Hence Alm's argument falls apart.
would be most attentive and Sir Robert Giffen might even twitch a little in his grave. And some readers might be willing to assume that the price elasticity for wheat is very high, although there appears to be little evidence for this.
However, Alm's conclusion certainly does not follow.
Assistant professor of economics
T-shirt ad offensive, insulting to women
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To the editor:
Business Manager
Don Grant
Editor
Steve Frazier
Ann Erbacher
I would like to protest the Kansan's continuing policy of publishing sexist advertising. Re: the ad that appeared in the classified section of the paper on Sept. 7, "Sexism," in a women's clothing shirt. I found this extremely offensive and shirty. As long as the student activity fee is helping to underwrite the cost of this newspaper, I think you should have a newspaper that is not insulting to women in your workplace with a modicum of intelligence in general.
Steve Fraser
Managing Editor
Jerry Box
Editor in Chief
Campus Editor
Campus Editor
Anti. Campus Editor
Direcet Steinem
Magazine Editor
Mellissa Thompson
Marion Leen
Sports Editor
Ano. Sports Editor
Nancy Dale
Leon Urnuth
Copy Chiefs
Laurie Daniel, Crawler Hunter
Make-up Editor
Make-up Editor
Southern Thornburg,
Pam Key
Wire Editors
Linda Finnegan
Writer Editorial Writers
Waitleshene
Britain Basel, Fam. Manson
Photographers
Staff Writers
John Tharp, Bob Beer
Buffalo Art
Linda Word, Mike Miller
Lawrence junior
Asso. Business Mgr Karen Wenderton
Past. Business Manager Nick Hardy
Manage Ant. Promotion Manager Nick Hardy
Admin. Advertising Mgr Allen Blair Towilker
Advertising Mgr Greg Murger
Greg Murger Classified Manager Greg Murger
Classified Manager Ann Hendricks
Photographer Steve Polem Lite Hosthuis
General Manager Advertising Adviser Rick Mussel Chuck Clowins
I for one, am extremely tired of having the female anatomy endlessly exploited in the media, and I do not see why the Kanas perpetuate this. Because this is supposedly a failure, or an indication of highly learning, why don't you appeal to people's minds and not their gonads?
Rumor has it that Marvin Vallis is so dirty that some high level administrators consider it to be the cyst of the campus and can't even force themselves to enter our
Cleaning shift change successful at Marvin
It used to be that bad until American Management took over. Now Marvin Hall has never been cleaner. For this reason, I read with amusement about the really terrible conditions of uncleaniness in campus buildings.
To the editor:
We intend to help American Management by encouraging faculty and students to become actively involved in environmental quality and we intend to begin at home. We hope faculty and students will react positively to this encouragement, because it will enhance the learning process.
We have worked carefully with Ron Hizner on "the cyst." We changed cleaning hours so that custodians work from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. Custodians like to work in the kitchen, but they also need to and can point out problem areas. Trash is emptied. Floors are mopped and buffed.
realizing the riskiness of farming, have entered agriculture as speculators, not producers. Because of rising land values, farmers in the Midwest invested for many large corporations. Between 1971 and 1976, when stocks and mutual funds behaved erratically, value per acre of farmland rose in every state—116 percent in Iowa, 135 percent in Nebraska, 148 percent in Iowa.
Corporations harvesting family farms
Publicly fretting about the demise of America's fiercely independent yeman, the family farmer, is a time-honored ritual of political campaigning in agricultural
Other schools and departments might consider changing cleaning hours to day shifts. Day shifts are coveted and custodians work hard to get and keep them.
School of Architecture and Urban Design
Assistant to the Dean
Surely, a candidate for public office in Kansas would only hurt his chances by not showing proper concern for the plight of the family farmer, whom campaign rhetoric extols, in the Jeffersonian tradition, as the industrial and economic backbone of the country.
Dennis E. Demer
Assistant to the Dept.
Efficiency arguments for large corporate farms are not persuasive. Corporate efficiency is more often than not financial rather than productive.
THE FAMILY FARMER has proved to be a reliable producer. Studies by the U.S. Department of Agriculture indicate that schools have concluded that economies of scale in farming end rather quickly. Indeed, large scale operations may become more efficient if these economies replace the owner's in-field management.
The appeal of the family farm rests largely in sentimentality—a romantic echo of simpler times that, likely as not, were far from simple.
RUT, HARD AS it was, farm life supposedly created strong, self-reliant citizens, the kind democracy needed if it was to endure. That myth still permeates campaign speeches sanctifying the family farmer.
For most of our nation's history the family farm was a mule, a walking plow, an animal, and 40 acres of land which, when times were good, grew with the addition of the back 40. "Work was hard, hours long and investment was heavy, as often as not, mere survival."
Farm owners clearly face a stiff challenge from large corporations in the rest of the century if corporate interest in farm land continues unchecked.
Time and technology have changed
Rick Alm
farming as much as any aspect of the society. The trend in Kansas is typical. The average Kansas farm is now a capital-intensive business enterprise of more than 600 acres worth $179,000. Cash receipts for the state's 70,000 farms was $3 million in
Farming has become big business. And because of cars and television, farms are no longer the isolated bastions of traditional rural virtue they were 20 years ago.
The evolution of enterprise farming and of farm life has eroded the validity of the traditional family farm concept, although it has become more apparent in discrepancy between farm myth and farm reality, however, should not lead voters to shrug off concern for the demise of the traditional family farm concept.
ALTHOUGH THE FAMILY farm has changed dramatically, it is not defunct. One part of the myth—the essential part—has not changed: the farms remain individually owned, virtually the last holdout against the coratee collossus.
But there is a danger that the family farm might, by the end of this century, follow the neighborhood grocer and the newspaper publisher into corporate oblivion.
Corporate power already surrounds the farmer. Menacingly. In the United States today one does not go to the valleys of Florida, but in the arid orchards of Florida or the dairy farms of Maryland to find agricultural power—one goes to the financial districts, from Montgomery Street in San Francisco to South Street in Chicago, to Wall Street in New York.
Corporations dominate the processing and distribution of the farmer's output; they provide him with machinery and fertilizer. They also provide him with giving U.S. farm land a predatory glance.
THE TREND TO corporate activity in American agricultural production has been sharp in recent years. Del Monte, Dole and Minute Maid, packing companies that have long had extensive agricultural holdings, are among the top producers in Kaiser Industries, Gettie Oil, Aetna and John Hancock. Mobil Oil grows oranges; CA raises训鼠s; Boeing grows potatoes.
Some of the new corporate owners,
Corporate America's vast financial resources will win out, of course, and the specter of Big Business controlling agriculture from seedling to supermarket should leave all of us more than a little ill at ease.
Small farmers facing tight finances
Pat Ross considers himself an optimistic farmer.
Ross, who with his father-in-law farms about 750 acres of the Kaw River bottoms northeast of Lawrence, hopes that farm prices will rise steadily and level off during the next few years.
The steady increase would allow him to protect his investment and make a profit. It would provide security for him.
But farmers, like Ross, in recent years have had to face angry consumers, government intervention and ever increasing costs, along with the traditional problems like droughts and hail.
THE SMALL FARMER, who accounts for only about 3 percent of the population, has few weapons in his fight for control.
"Any administration we get in Washington is going to be consumer-oriented with a cheap food policy," Ross said. "I just hope that the housewife will accept a gradual rise in food prices over the years.
"But we don't want food prices to go too high too fast or we'll have something like the best bovetail a few years ago."
"I suppose we'll have to buy some more land pretty soon to be keep up," he said, "but it's going to be tough."
The optimism in Ross' voice changes a bit when he begins to talk about the costs of running a family farm today.
"It makes you look real hard when you go to buy some
"Any administration we get in Washington is going to be consumer oriented with a cheap food policy.I just hope that the housewife will accept a gradual rise in food prices over the years."
ROSS ESTIMATED that land in the Kaw bottom would
in, because the money you have to borrow is more expensive and the land itself is a lot higher."
cost about $2,500 an acre and the less fertile land around Lawrence would run about $1,000.
But that's not all. It's a lot tougher for the farmer today
considering the cost of farm machinery.
A tractor that cost $10,000 in 1970 would run at least $25,000 today. Ross said.
"It's a whole new ball game when you come to buying equipment these days," he said.
equipment. This increase is compared to the price of farm products, which have rinkly only slightly since 1970, and are always subject to severe drops, the plight of the farmer becomes keener.
To contend with drops in the market, which can be caused by anything from a good wheat harvest in Australia to health warnings by the Food and Drug Administration, to keep their means of livelihood, farmers have had to
ONE CHANGE has been the diversification of the family farm.
armm
this grass wheat, corn, milo and soybeans on his land.
The soybeans are sold at the local elevator, while the corn,
wheat and milo are fed to the cattle on his farm.
Along with wheat, corn and milo, this company also keeps cattle for a
company that does research on the animals.
tethers. You can always day you have to diversity to stay alive. If one crop goes out of our soybeans did you tie with the other crop? How many weeds did you tie with the other crop?
However, some farmers, especially in the western parts of Kansas, do not have fertile ground like Ross, and have little choice in what they raise. In western Kansas, wheat is about the only crop heavyhearted with without irrigation. If the market market failures, the farmer just has to hope for lent bankers and better luck next year.
ANOTHER METHOD to contend with the market is
seiling the crop at a contracted price before it is harvested. This method called biding, insures the farmer of a set quantity of crops that will be harvested.
"I guess the strike movement got some good publicity, but I don't agree with the call for 100 percent parity because it would make farmland too lucrative to outside investors."
should climb, the farmer is obliged to sell the product at the price he contracted before harvest.
"Most farmers hedge their crops these days," Ross said, "because you've got to insure yourself against losses."
Last winter, Kansas farmers, especially wheat growers,
raised a ruckus calling for higher farm prices and
competition.
Although higher prices would be very beneficial to the small farmer, there are some problems also.
"I guess the strike movement got some good publicity," Ross said, "but I don't agree with the call for 100 percent parity because it would make farmland too lucrative to outside investors."
So the small farmer is caught in a tight situation. He must make enough money to eat and protect his investment, but if he makes too much outside investors are likely to come in and buy up all his land.
SO WHAT is the small farmer to do? Perhaps his pioneer spirit and love of the land will pull him through.
But for the young man trying to start farming, such spirit is little help. Because of land and equipment costs it is almost impossible for one to enter farming without inheiriting or "marrying into the land."
The number of farmers is continually dropping and the family farmer is becoming more of an elite member of farming.
With the financial problems and natural risks involved in farming it takes a special person—a combination businessman and pioneer—like Pat Ross to operate the vanishing family farm.
"I love farming," Ross said with a broad grin. "I wouldn't do anything else.