Farm Living

Farming has come a long way since the early 1900s and into the 1940s and 50s. Gone are the mules, teams of horses and farm hands. Today, just about everything on the farm is done by machine. Most of these machines are very large and very expensive.

Our fathers and grandfathers who farmed jumped on their tractors and worked the fields with the sun beating down on them. Today, farmers climb up into their large tractors that are computer controlled and have air conditioned cabs for their comfort.

The hard work has been taken out of farming, but so have the profits. Equipment is very expensive, tractors in the past cost a couple of hundred dollars, today they cost a quarter of a million and up. Farming is also almost totally controlled by the government; you can plant these crops this year on this piece of land, and next year you will grow nothing. The government will pay you for growing nothing. Farming now is big business.

There are huge Agribusinesses that want to enter into contracts with farmers. The corporations will provide the seeds, fertilizers, equipment etc. and the farmer will be paid a fee, usually quite small, for his work of growing the products. The corporations are making the money while the small farmer is starving. The piece and tranquility of living on a farm and producing your own food and making a living doing it is a thing of the past and all but impossible these days.