New-York tribune., 1900-05-12
IRON AND HARDWARE PRICES.

Evidently we shall hear much next fall about
the dreadful tariff and the deadly trusts which
have made everything more costly, particularly
implements and tools and articles of household
use. One of the gifted manufacturers of misin-
formation who delight Free Traders with their
work recently arranged thrilling table in
which prices of half dozen articles of hard
ware with others We're compared. The articles
were well selected 10 show a material advance
in prices and to create the impression that all
articles of the same kind had been in like man
ner advanced. This bit of untruth prompted a
little investigation. Quotations of hardware last
month compared with those Of July. 1881,
while the Wilson tariff still in force and
prices of iron and steel and their products had
not begun their remarkable advance. Then it
came to light that prices of hardware had been
affected surprisingly little by the rise in iron.
The quotations compared were those of THE
Iron Age recognized the best authority in
the trade embracing many hundred rates of
discount, each applicable to a long list of prod
ucts of a given class make. Quotations
which appeared to refer to altered lists were
omitted for both years, and all quotations of
products of hemp leather or chiefly of other
materials than iron, and only those embraced
which appeared to fix the selling prices of def
mite articles named or the same list of articles
at the different dates. Even then the 663
quotations covered prices of several thousand
articles
The most interesting fact to our Free Trade
friends is that nearly half the whole number Of
quotations. namely. 324. were exactly the same
for both dates. In ninety-two cases the later
quotations. with iron dearer than it has been
for many years actually lower than the
quotation in 1897, with iron cheaper than it ever
until within few years Thus 81. ~ per
of oil rhp Sbo
whatever In prices, over an eighth, or 1898 per
cent having declined, while almost half or
81 per cent. were not changed OF the remain
ing quotations. not quite three-eghths of the
whole number, or 1875 per cent, scarcely any
made advances at all commensurate with the
rise of 12O per cent in iron Only two quotations
rose over 100 per cent. and only fifteen rose
more than 80 but less than 100 per cent While
these seventeen might have been picked as
some have been. Ito illustrate the rise in prices
of hardware" the remainder advanced in no
case more than 30 per cent much less than half
the rise in iron. Only fourteen or . II per cent.
rose from 40 to 30 per cent; only thrty-five or
J.2S per cent rose from 30 to 10 per cent only
forty-seven quotations, or 100 per cent of the
whole. were 20 to 30 per cent higher this year
than in 1897 while 11.61 per cent. or seventy
seven quotations. rose not more than 20 but over
10 per cent, and SO per cent, fifty-seven
quotations, rose 10 per cent or less.
No exact statement of the general effect of so
many and such widely differing changes is DOS
sihle, and even If every item of the 663 be
| reckoned Of equal importance with every other
the net result of all gains and losses can only
be approximately stated. But on that suppo-
sition the declines in ninety-two cases appear 10
be about equivalent to a decline of 1880 per
cent in them all, while the advances in 247 cases
appear 10 be. about auuiya to an odvon.o 20
81 per cent in them ALL which with 324 cases
unchanged would make the result equivalent 10
net advance of Go per cent in the prices of all
the articles. 1t does not matter al ALL however
whether such an approximation is considered
correct or not, since the only fact Of Importance