Farmers

In her 1922 book One of Ours, about a midwestern farmer who enlists in WWI, Willa Cather writes:

The farmer raised and took to market things with an intrinsic value; wheat and corn as good as could be grown anywhere in the world, hogs and cattle that were the best of their kind. In return he got manufactured articles of poor quality; showy furniture that went to pieces, carpets and draperies that faded, clothes that made a handsome man look like a clown. Most of his money was paid out for machinery, – and that, too, went to pieces. A steam thrasher didn't last long; a horse outlived three automobiles.