The Farm Working Force of 1943

Excerpts from the report: About 14.5 million different persons worked on the Nation's farms in 1943. Some of these worked full-time, some for very short periods only, but altogether they worked about 20 to 25 billion hours to turn out last year's record production of food and fiber. These figures are derived from a Nation-wide sample enumeration made early in 1944 to provide information on the full- and part-time farm workers in 1943, on the amount of time they put in farm work, and on the season of the year when they worked. Because of the seasonal nature of farm work and the large turnover of persons who do small amounts of farm work during the year, the total number of different workers in a year is naturally greater than the number at work at any given time--even at the peak month. Persons who were living on farms in January 1944--farmers, members of their families, and hired workers who live on farms--did the bulk of the farm work in 1943. Of the 12.4 million different workers for whom the survey yields information, 9.7 million or 78.5 percent were farm residents. On the average, they worked a greater number of weeks and more hours per week than did farm workers who came out from cities, towns, and villages, and contributed 88.4 percent of the total time put into agricultural work during the year.