hows your neibourhood

[Horse]

Heard an article a few days ago and it said 79% of family farms had off farm income, it didn't put any other #that I heard. Got to thinking and yea that is probably right, although most in this area farm 100s not 000s of acres, lots have livestock. There is a lot that work in town and was a lot worked in oil patch, those are. Re thinking there positions.
Seems a poor way to run your food supply. How many of you have a wife with a off farm job or work off farm yourself.
I wonder does oil revenue or rental house in town count. Trucking? Just curious as we have some revenue from oil but nothing from wages.
Also seen where less than 350,000 gross is small farm ???

[15444]

I would say it is much higher than that - more like 90-95%. Always get shocked look from new vets and visitors who learn we do not work off-farm. Especially with only 70 cow pairs. Always like to blow a hole in the theory that people need 300+ cows to make a living. No, you need 300+ cows to support your lifestyle. Quit giving a shit what the neighbors are doing or saying and you can enjoy life with much less. Knew a guy with 500 cows who didn't know how to change out a electrical outlet in his house, he needed half a the value of one calf just to pay an electrician to do it. Stupid people in this world need lots of money just to survive.

[dalek]

I would say it is much higher than that - more like 90-95%. Always get shocked look from new vets and visitors who learn we do not work off-farm. Especially with only 70 cow pairs. Always like to blow a hole in the theory that people need 300+ cows to make a living. No, you need 300+ cows to support your lifestyle. Quit giving a shit what the neighbors are doing or saying and you can enjoy life with much less. Knew a guy with 500 cows who didn't know how to change out a electrical outlet in his house, he needed half a the value of one calf just to pay an electrician to do it. Stupid people in this world need lots of money just to survive.

Most here wouldn't want to live from farm income if they could, they'd rather do just enough to get the writeoffs for new ATVs every couple years and complain about how they just can't make a living off 100 acres like grandpa did because of "the system". Never mind that grandpa did everything with an 8n while selling cream from 20 cows and feeding the skim to a barnful of pigs and logging all winter while the current generation would rather spend 4 days a year haying in the ac to feed a handful of cows and can't even bother hauling manure

[fjlip]

Been farming since school, never had a off farm paycheck. Doubt if anyone would hire me. Guess if you go long enough, 45 years, you are successful. Wife worked 3 years, 28 years at home, full partner. Never paid wages other than to the boys. Just some young guys around here work away in winter, older rarely do. Big farmers busy all winter hauling grain, fixing stuff.

[GDR]

I worked 13 yrs while getting started on my own out of school, been home 7yrs now full time. Towards the end of my working days neither the job or the farm was fun and both were not getting done properly. Was a scary jump to lose the paycheck but in reality didn't make much difference. (It did help we had some pretty good grain and livestock prices last 7yrs too) Agree with the other comments there are lots of way to make money or rather earn wealth on the farm and bigger is not always better. We hire very little out and have kept expenses and machinery costs down.

Lots of guys around here home full time but we're in mixed farming country so I think that makes a difference too if you put a few hungry cows in the daily plan.

I do think any "official" numbers about farming are skewed because tons of people work it so they have enough farm income to get farming status but in reality aren't farmers. Not sure governments, pollsters, or media are smart enough to tell the difference.

Doing taxes this week and looking at a tax bill comparable to what my annual salary was before. To work another job where 40% would get taxed away, then add the costs associated with working, plus lost time with farm and kids. Not gonna happen again.

[GDR]

Only other thought is it should be mandatory for everyone to have a job first. Lots of life experience and different perspectives you can learn from others that you may not get from the family farm growing up and taking over the reins. Also if you've never worked for someone else you might not make the best employer, nor appreciate the freedoms you have.

[farmaholic]

I worked partime off the farm for nine years starting the fall I got out of highschool...of all places in Regina's under a roof SWP stockyards! It kinda worked out good for employer and employee...I would start in fall with the fall run of calves, work all winter until spring busy season started. And work a wee bit in summer now and then. Felt a bit guilty at times leaving the parents at home with chores and some other work. There was no expectation on their part that I should have stayed home...we weren't big enough at the time. But I bought land three years into that nine year stint so the extra income came in handy. There are some farm kids around, then and now, that didn't work off farm because there was enough to do at home.

And now the rant: with today's land prices is no off farm income even an option unless you're born with a "gold" spoon in your mouth or part of "Silver Platter Farms". I know lots of local farm kids who would like to buy land but are shut out of the market because they can't compete with cash or the well heeled.

Read the Western Producer article about investors owning Sask farm land. Andjelik had a section about 5 miles away from us. Hard to complain when the whole scenario inflated the price of the land I own as well. I suppose you could say it injected alot of new money into the Sask land seller's bank accounts....and that would be mostly Sask residents because of the previous restrictive ownership laws. The only question is will it do more harm than good for Sask's long term farming prospects and farmers. GWW123 wants to leave Scotland because of the tenant farming situation. Sad part is, its now cheaper to rent than buy.....but no equity in the most valuable asset, land. But the highly depreciateable machinery is your problem....

[Braveheart]

There are a few partners working off farm in this area to help make ends meet. Sometimes both partners, but usually one. There are some wives that have off farm employnent to fulfill their own career goals eg. teacher, principal, nursing. There a couple of wives that work off farm because either the father in law is nuts, or the husband gets a bit stressed and distance for a few hours a day is needed. Overall, the percentage of off farm employment I think is lower than it was through the 80's and 90's. But since the sod was turned here I think it has always been something that happened.

[farmaholic]

I wonder how many CEOs, COOs, VPs, Presidents, .....upper management types are flipping burgers at a local burger joint or stocking shelves at Walmart for a second source of income....yet if you want to farm it has become a bit of a prerequisite that the farm needs off farm income to subsidize it! And some people wonder why primary ag production has special needs....

[SASKFARMER3]

I did work off the farm for the first 22 years thats 4 as summer student and the rest in Saskatoon and Regina. But also farmed from either city.

Wife worked full time in City in Medical field and now retired. Still dabbles for fun out side the health district.

Wouldn't of done it any other way.

You have a whole other prospective away from the farm.

Both of my boys won't farm right off the cuff. Each will leave and take some sort of education and then work away if they want to come back its theirs if not its still theirs to rent out to others.

[Braveheart]

Farmaholic, the thing about CEOs etc is that like many of us, their day starts at 5 am or earlier, and ends long after most have gone home. Barely time to eat burgers let alone flip them.

Whether CEOs or our neighbour, it's too easy to look across the fence and judge. We can never really know what's going on with someone else.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

I've worked off the farm most of the time since grade 11. As far as I know everyone younger than 70 around here works off the farm. Which makes for a much different landscape, probably more quarter section farms than all others put together.

We can complain all we want about the affordability of farming, but by subsidizing it with off farm income, we are part of the problem. land prices wouldn't be where they are without it. If none of us worked off farm, we could afford land with farming income alone since land would be so much cheaper.

Everyone has a different reason, I needed the income to buy land. Most want the income to buy shiny machinery. Some want the lifestyle the extra income provides. And many its just a necessity.

Back when I was 25, the unlimited hours of an off farm job dwarfed the farm income and bought lots of land. Went back to work in recent years after growing the farm substantially, and discovered that the off farm income isn't worth the time it takes, and doesn't contribute much to the bottom line. Land went up many times more than wages did in the mean time. Back to mostly farming again now.

[blackpowder]

I only worked away sporadically. Shouldve done and bought own land back then but........
Most farms made easier back then with one partner making household living off farm.
Have mostly farmed alone.
Today I'm probably out of touch with younger gen.
Here, multigenerational farms mostly. Smaller ish guys second income maybe, paycheck if so.
Bigger ish, off farm businesses mostly or nothing, some wives working off. Heck as long as everyone contributes. Wives drive navigators.
As farms get bigger the cost of living per acre gets smaller. Also, a winters wages logging or pulling pipe might go a long way towards modest living but wouldnt pay the seed bill. You have to be very organized with a support team to go to camp and farm. I always said that for some, 1/3 of their wages went towards missed opportunities. If not more.

[Partners]

The people that I graduated with.The ones that went farming are still farming..Guess no one wants to be the first to retire..
The other non farmers are all retired with money being a non issue for them..they travel..golf..spend lots of time with grand kids..No worries about the weather or the shitty grain prices..