Spreading Wealth

Red Deer, Alta., is a Canadian farm center of only 25,000 population. Yet in a single day recently, Red Deer's merchants rang up $1,000,000 in sales to Christmas-shopping prairie farmers. Some bought second and third TV sets; their wives got leopard jackets ("much choicer than mink") and Russian squirrel coats. A local Chrysler dealer had 68 paid-up back orders for cars, while the Ford man stopped taking orders altogether "until we catch up." For winter vacations, Red Deer's travel agents recommend Hawaii, Hong Kong, the West Indies. When summer comes, the In thing in prairie status symbols will be tractors with power steering and combines with air conditioning.

Thanks to 1963's enormous wheat sales to Russia and Red China, Canada's farmers have never had it so good. All told, the deals come to between 337 million and 437 million bushels and as much as $860 million in payments spread over several years. By next July 1, when the final checks for 1963 wheat are mailed out, farmers in the province of Saskatchewan alone will have received $448 million from all sources for their crop. Land values on the prairies are soaring out of sight, as U.S. farmers from Montana and North Dakota hurry across the border to get in on the bounty. One farmer in Alberta refused to deliver any of his winter crop until after the first of the year. His income for 1963 was already well over $100,000. "And that," he believes, "is enough for one year."

Partly as a result of the wheat sales and partly because of continuing U.S. prosperity ("The way they go, we go--only a little better," says one Canadian official), Canada's entire economy showed impressive growth for 1963. Gross national product grew 6% to a new record of $42.5 billion, exports jumped 8%, and foreign-exchange reserves for November stood at a near-record $2.6 billion. The forecast for 1964: more of the same.

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