l to the greater ease with which the same product can be
offered in market. If the difference were only a mile of hauling all
produce and all commodities for which produce is exchanged, that cost of
transportation would make the value of the nearest land. If the difference
is simply in yield for a given amount of labor, the land which yields
thirty bushels of wheat to the acre, when land which yields twenty bushels
can be had for the taking, will be worth ten bushels of wheat a year, and
its value will be estimated in dollars at a sum which securely at interest
will bring a similar return. If, by and by, the demand for food or
improvement in transportation or an easier method makes it worth while to
cultivate land yielding only ten bushels of wheat to the acre, the annual
value of land yielding twenty bushels will be ten bushels, and that of the
land yielding thirty bushels will have become twenty bushels.

Thus the rent, and correspondingly the value of farms, increases with the
increasing demand for farm products, whether that demand results from the
increased number of eaters at hand, from the increased ability of these
eaters to supply their wants, or from ready transportation to eaters
elsewhere. Many influences in various directions affect the tendency to an
increase of land values with the increase of population. Some have been
led to the assumption that only the multiplication of food-eaters,
increasing the need for land, makes rent possible. Connecting it with the
theory of Malthus that population tends to increase in geometrical ratio,
while food can increase only in arithmetical ratio, they have denounced
rent as a price paid to monopolists under stress of danger from
starvation. These forget that rent is payable as truly out of increasing
abilities of individuals to meet increasing wants as under the spur of
more distressing wants. Indeed, starvation, or the approach to it, never
pays rent, however strong an incentive it may be to promise rent.

_Rent in price of products._--Does the value of the land upon which my
wheat is raised enter into the price of my wheat? If all land values were
destroyed, would the wheat of the world be cheaper, because its cost would
be diminished? The price at any time is just enough to bring the supply to
market and keep it there. A portion of the supply has cost even more than
it brings to its owner. If any brings more than cost, the difference goes
either to the energetic raise