SHEEP FARM PROFITS

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28802, 24 January 1959, Page 14

SHEEP FARM PROFITS

1956-57 Average After Tax

The average net income equivalent to “take-home” pay. of the New Zealand sheepfarmers in 1956-57 was about £4l, not £6l as reported by the Press Association from Wellington on Thursday. The higher figure was a miscontruction of statistics given in a special report by the Department of Statistics, which has since corrected the impression. The average gross return from a sheep farm in that income year was at the rate of £ll5 a week, and the average cost of running a farm was £6l a week, leaving the average gross personal income of the farmer at £54 a week: If the farmer was a married man without children, income tax at the rate of approximately £l3 7s 6d a week was payable, reducing the “take-home" pay. or net income, to £4O 12s 6d If he were a married man with two children the tax deduction would have been approximately £l2 3s leaving “takehome” pay of £4l 17s. Th farm expenditure figure of £6l quoted by- the department included rent, rates, land tax. insurance interest, depreciation wages and rations, contractors, repairs and maintenance, manures and seeds, freight and cartage, petrol, farm truck expenses, tractor expenses, stock foods. medicineSv electric power, developmental costs, and other dis-