The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-04-01
CAUSE OF OUR CONTINUING
PROSPERITY.

Inc industrial depression winch mas DeSH
reported in Germany and the dizziness in
Great Britain. which many expected would
check the prosperity in this country, has
not had that effect. So far from that, the
reports received in New York from all
parts of the country tell of extraordinary
activity in every branch of trade and in
dustry, indicating that when the millions of
people in this country are in position to
make a market for their own products the
demand they make is so large that it gives
full employment to all their energies in pro-
duction, quite regardless of the conditions
elsewhere. Despite the rather discouraging
reports from Europe, at 40 time since the
era of good lines set in, five years ago, has
the outlook been so universally satisfac-
tory. a New York writer on commercial
topics says that "a new high mark is being
made in the record of national prosperity
and literally there seems no limit TO the
sweep of the grand tidal wave; there is no
cloud in any quarter Of the sky There is
something more than remarkable in all
this. Take the iron and steel industry.
Production has been doubled since the lean
year of 1896; every branch of the industry
has been driven TO the utmost since the
prosperous days set in. yet after five years
of this unexampled activity the orders for
steel are six months in advance of the ca
pacity of the mills to supply. Croakers said
that the activity of the early months OF 1898
could not last a year. and conservative
men. when exorbitant prices in 1899 caused
a decline in the demand for a little period,
feared that the end was near, but when
prices fell 10 a fair figure the demand again
became active and has increased ever since.
Now we have become so used to it that we
express little surprise that the tide of pros
perity continues to sweep onward.
The continuing prosperity of this country,
with the general quietness or depression in
Europe. provokes the inquiry whether or
not a large nation with diversified resources
may not pursue an economic policy which
will place it beyond the influence of the
conditions which prevail in other countries.
Inability to dispose of the products of it's
industrial forces is the real cause of de-
preston. Ample and well-sustained mar
kets are necessary for industrial and COM
mercial activity. Statesmen realize that
truth, but they seem to have failed to real
ize that the most reliable market is at
home and that the home market will be val
liable to the extent that the mass of people
have the means with which to purchase.
Those who call themselves political or So
ciaI economists seem not to have laid
hold of the pIafp foot tbat n oorptrrr NTH n
population every million of which earns or
has TO spend $500. 600, 900 a year is worth
twice as much as a market as n country
whose every million earns and has to spend
from trade and industry $4,000 10000. The
depression of which Germany complains at
the present time is due largely to the mis-
taken policy of producing for foreign mar
kets instead of stimulating home consump-
ton by adopting a more liberal scale of
wages, thereby stimulating the home ca
pacity of consumption. Italy is impover-
ished and its poverty-bitten people seek
other lands because wages are so low that
the masses cannot earn sufficient to make a
home market. Germany has stimulated a
wonderful production of beet sugar by pro-
lection, bounties and the cheap labor Of
women and children, but the defect in the
policy is that Germany raises sugar for
other markets than Germany. Would it not
be better if it's sugar. which sells at home
for the equivalent of I cents a pound, and
in England for 31z cents, should be sold at
home for the lower price, thus doubling the
home consumption? And if there is any
secret as to our Astounding prosperity is it
not that our millions are more fully en-
ployed, and now make, earn or produce
twice as much per capita as the average of
the civilized nations? This idea does not
get into the textbooks of the higher
schools, but is not the full employment of
the American people at twice the returns Of
any other people per capita the real cause
Of the continuing prosperous conditions?