The Grenada sentinel. [volume] (Grenada, Miss.) 1868-1955, 1908-03-28
TARIFF ON WOODEN GOODS.
Where the United States Collects 81
the Trust Collects SIS


highly by the tariff than the wooden
manufacturer. The average rate on
all manufactured articles, of which
wool is the chief constituent, is 9O.3O
| per cent. which when the freight and
other charges are added to the duty
about doubles the average cost on i'm
| ported wooden articles. When the tar
if tax on some wooden articles is con
sidered, it would seem that even our
Republican protectiOnist friends have
overshot the mark. For instance, on
long blankets the purchaser has TO pay
a tariff of 1854 per cent; on dress
goods, 1854 per cent; on knit
fabrics, 1873 per cent; on cloth, 1878
per cent, and even on shoddy, which
is largely used here for cheap cloth
ing. the tariff tax is 174.55 per cent.
That is The actual tariff tax paid on
imports Of the articles quoted for the
fiscal year ending June 80, 1906,
which is the last official report pub
liShed.
The American Wooden Company,
known as the wooden trust, is the chief
recipient of these tariff favors, for the
high duties on imported goods pre-
vent much from being purchased but
allow the trust to add to its profits
the amount Of what similar imported
goods would pay. Thus. II a yard Of
cloth cost n dollar in England, the
tariff tax when it is imported here IS
$1.36, making the cost here 1886,
without reckoning the freight and
other expenses, or the profit to the I'M
porter. The English manufacturer
must have made a good profit Cd that
yard of cloth. 1t probably cost him
so cents, so his profit was 20 cents
and our importer paid 81 and thea had
to pay the cost Of importing aDG the
tariff tax. A similar yard Of cloth
manufactured here would cost about
81 and the ordinary profit would be
25 per cent, the same az the English
manufacturer made, which should
bring the wholesale selling price here
to $1.25 a yard. But as the tariff tax
brings the cost Of the foreign yard
Of cloth to $3.50, our manufacturer
can add a further profit Of Sill a yard
to the price as the extra profit he can
charge, before the imported goods a
compete with him. To prevent this
foreign competition our manufacturer
sells the homemade cloth just
enough cheaper than the foreign made
cloth can be sold for. So the wooden
trust can charge ST a yard extra profit
and still beat the foreign manufacture
er II cents a yard.
1t does not require an expert on
tariff plundering to discover that the
American consumer not only pays the
tariff on the imported goods, but also
pays the trusts the tariff they charge
in increased profit. But this is not
the worst of the tariff robbery, for
where there is one yard of cloth, or
any other article, imported there are
hundreds of such of domestic manu-
facture consumed on which the trusts
and combines have collected their tar
if profit.
The tariff robbery is perhaps more
fully shown when 1t is considered that
the total value of all the wooden goods
imported for the fiscal year 1906 was
$22,353, 591 on which a tariff tax was
paid of s2O,1S5,O4S, or $3.50 per cent.
The cost value of wooden and wOrsted
goods manufactured in the United
States in 1905. is given in the United
States Statistical Abstract as S307,.
GAL ITO and the price at which these
goods were sold in consequence Of the
tariff protection vas approximately
doubled. So whereas the United States
collected a little over twenty million
in tariff taxes the trust and other
wooden manufacturers collected about
$500, OOO, 900 extra profit in ons
quence of tariff protection or SIS for
every dollar collected by the govern.
ment.
Is not this wooden schedule Of the
tariff law a monument Of ~plundering,
and yet a Republican congress stands
pat and refuses to even consider re.
vising such protection to the trusts.