The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1884-02-06
Datuaiialt Gazttte.
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY G. 1854.
Our New York Letter.
COMMERCIAL. ABooM AND IRIS CONSEQUENCES.
Nru YnRK Lannarv IL 1891

COMMERCIAL. BOOM AND IRIS CONSEQUENCES.
NV York. January IA, 1884.
The year 1888 closed with an unbroken
record of decline in prices of leading sta
pie food products and leading articles Of
merchandise. The period of liquidation
which began early in 1882 has continued
for twenty months. The topic of the hour
among business men now is, whether we
have reached the bottom. The causes of
enforced economy in production due to
restricted purchases on all hands, have
been too frequently outlined to require
elaborate explanation. The latter half of
1879 had witnessed several seasons of good
crops at home and correspondingly short
harvests in Europe The United States
had been selling abroad freely of its sur
plus produce and this, in connection with
the six preceding years of moderate pur-
chases by consumers had brought the
country as whole to degree of well-to-
do-itiveness which showed itself in rapidly
| increasing demands for almost every arti-
Gle of commerce, and, by the aid of the
still remaining high protective war tariff
on imported products, stimulated our ma
| tive industries in a marked degree. The
Il
/ the so called boom of 1S70-72. From 1873
to 1879 it had paid the penalty and aided
by favoring weather and fertile soil had
laid the foundations for another squirt.
This began in the midsummer and fall of
1879. OF the enormous increase in indus
trial producing capacity from 1880 to 1882
it is unnecessary to speak at length. The
great railway building era is comprised in
that period and steel rail mills were con
structed which enabled the railway kings
to lay from 1000 to 1900 miles of rails
per annum. All other industries to con.
siderable extent kept pace with this, and
in two or three years greatly exceeded the
home requirements Railway building hao
fallen far behind its own records, cotton
and woollen mills had increased their an
nual output until the goods remained il
the warehouses in sufficient quantity t.
warn the proprietors that for the time be
ing the public were stocked. To compli
cate this, there came the new cotton mill
at the south where the raw material wa
to be obtained without paying the freigh
which entered perforce into the account
of the New England mills. In this wa,
competition injured the business and pros
poets of the northern and eastern mill
employed on the class of fabrics under
taken at the south. Failures were not IN
known as a result, and the several man
moth cotton goods auction sales takini
place at New York during the year jus
past constituted the means taken to tur
surplus, and not readily saleable stock
into cash The blanket sales during tn
same season and of kindred proportion
tells of the pinch which came to the WOO
len industry. In raw iron there was a
enforced stoppage of about eighty-fiv
furnaces between January LIST, 1888, an
January LIST, 1884. Prices had decline
during the year from $3.50 to $50, an
} many of the less efficient stocks found
impossible to do business protitably. Som
few steel rail mills have shut down.
practically so. One, at Joliet, Ill, and I'll
Vulcan at ST. Louis. While the LATTE
may not have actually banked its fires
, is known to be turning orders-at mark
rates, over to other mills.