New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1877-01-13
4 HINT FOR THE TINES.

There are two or three articles the prices
of which should be brought down to suit the
times. One of these is meat. The price of
almost every other commodity has fallen with
the fail of gold, but the butchers still hold
their rates in New-York markets precisely as
high as they were during the war, when the
great herds OF the North West went south TO
supply the army. They know that their sales
are certain, be the prices what they may
people must have meat, be their coats ever so
shabby or their own profits brought down to
a minimum. We adverted to this matter last
Winter, and to an experiment which was
being tried in Philadelphia Of bringing fresh
meat from Chicago in cars reduced to % OF
tcmperature. The beef and mutton were the
same as that brought by the butchers on the
hoof, but finer in quality, shaving been killed
in good condition in Chicago and thus avoid
in, the long, heating journey of the thirsty,
wearled animals, which makes the best flesh
tough and stringy The experiment, we now
learn, was a complete success, being supported
by q large capital. The frozen meat Is sold
(and TO the best class of citizens) ut such rates
as 10 cents per pound for the choice cuts of
sirloin, 16 cents per pound for delicious South
down lamb and mutton, and proportionately
less for the inferior grades of meat The
butchers throughout the city have been forced
to reduce their prices approximately: indeed,
so urgent was the pressure that during the EX-
position, when they had counted on IA golden
harvest, their prices were actually lower than
during the previous Summer. Now there is no
reason why poor mechanic in New-Y0rk
should pay his weeks wages for lump Of
tough, unwholcsOme meat, while his brother in
Philadelphia feeds his whole family on juicy
steaks, and jngles his pocketful of money
afterward. Some OF our capitalists would find
a certain profit in this investment and earn the
reward besides Of public benefactors.
Another commodity which should come down
is domestic service. This has maintained its
unreasonably high rates because the whole
business lies in the hands of women, who are
not apt to consider the rules of supply and
demand, or any fact bearing on the subject
but their own immediate need. They paid
their cook 50 or So per week ten years ago,
and they pay her the same now, although dry
goods, rents, provisions, and their own incomes,
probably, have fallen off one-half in the mean
time. When the necessity for economy be-
stIInScut, uOuSthttptlS Tue
of servants instead of cutting down the wages
of all. Hence the tenement houses are crowded
with unemployed women, while a few receive
more wages than is their proportion according
to the times.
Another place in which reduction of price
would be productive of immediate good effect
is ut the entrance doors of the theaters and
all places of amusement. From every side
come complaints long and deep of the "poor
business" done by all purveyOrs of public
entertainment. Stars in the cities who were
wont to crowd the house from pit to dome
declaim too often to q CHASTITY array of empty
benches; prma donnas are drug-few care
to exchange the scarce greenbacks for their
sweetest notes; the combination companies
that usually go reaping full harvcsts this sea-
son in the pretty little theatcrs and opera
houses of inland towns come back in debt and
despair. The Brooklyn horror has had much
to do with this sudden falling off in receipts.
but it is caused more by the fact that the whole
country is ecOnomizing, and begins naturally
enough, with its luxuries. "A man Is not going
to spend two or three dollars Cor an opera or