GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

19-05-2003, 02:08 AM

On Monday, in article

"Torsten Brinch" wrote:

On Mon, 06 Jan 2003 13:12:25 +0000 (GMT),
("David G. Bell") wrote:

I would argue that Cash Income is misleading because some of these costs
may have been deferred in hard times, and Cash Income will thus not fall
quite so rapidly as other measures.

You are forgetting, that the reason why the alternative measure which
everyone appear to have been brainwashed with -- Net Farm Income -- is
falling more rapidly is -not- that it involves a correction for this
effect.

So why don't you tell us just what the difference is?

You are also forgetting and that the use of Net Farm Income is
considered flat out malpractice, Cash Income the better choice for the
purpose of comparison with other income earners in society, which is
what we are doing here for the moment.

Since when? I can assure you that I've not heard that claim before.

Cash Income figures indicate that the avg ability of farms in UK to
generate Cash Income has dropped to about half of what it was in 1995,
from about £55000 to about £30000.

Now, just which "average" is being used? Arithmetic mean? Mode?
Median? And is the average used some other measure of business size, or
is this the average Cash Income? How does it relate to business size an
turnover?

You do know the differences, and why they're important? And what's the
distribution? I'm fairly confident it will not be one of the usual
statistical distributions: it certainly isn't for the holding size.

Oh, what the heck, here's some figures for 1998 -- if you want something
more recent, find them and post them:

Holding Number of Percentage of
Size (Ha) Holdings Total Number

Under 10 48900 28.3%
10 - 30 41900 24.2%
30 - 50 23000 13.3%
50 - 100 29600 17.1%
100 - 200 19000 11.0%
200 - 300 5400 3.1%
300 - 500 3400 2.0%
500 - 700 1000 0.6%
700 and over 800 0.5%

Oh, and BTW, unless you're using the X-no-archive: header, people will
be reading your postings long after the URLs you give have vanished.
How will they know what on earth ypou're talking about?

--
David G. Bell -- SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.

"Let me get this straight. You're the KGB's core AI, but you're afraid
of a copyright infringement lawsuit over your translator semiotics?"
From "Lobsters" by Charles Stross.