The Birmingham age-herald., 1910-12-18
EX|[ES FROM THE , BUSINESS WORLD
Big Men Frequently Lose
 Their Fat Jobs
AND WALK THE STREETS
But They Do Not Suffer for Anything T But Want of Employmcnt-Do Something Else Till
 Luck Turns
rom the New York Press.

for the necessities of life. Nearly all of \, them have comfortable incomes. few of & them even are rich and need have no @ Thought at all for the morrow. But they
 are jobless and chafe under their en-
 forced inact!on and exile from the bus # mess world.
 4 The consultations of great plants and Enterprises that have been the feat # ure Of recent years, and still Is going z On, have put those prosperous and able 'l 1r en down and out for the time being
 When two great establishments that been competing actively combine, the < little men who have to be thrown out ' usua1ly get on their feet again quickly x But it is different when 1t comes to
 <5c,oO0 year president or s25,o00 general
 nanager. He cannot take any lesser job Y than he had. His pride would not permit
 him to be an underling once he has been 88a chief. His career would be ruined. AeOn the other hand, he is so high-priced x ~ That few businesses can use him. So, { In nearly every case, he waits and waits Ehoping the big opening will come. Elk dsHperience teaches that it is not likely to # flor many a long day. Some of these big 1smen feel in their heart of hearts that 3&.they will never get another real chance.
 .But they appear hopful, and, always keep Ras close as possible to the center of af- E 4fairs. 4# When the financiers who are merging
 *fwo or more combinations have to choose |34a head for the new combination the X 8xhoce Is not governed by the degree of Ability of the men they have to select ls s8. om. There. may be reasons for pre- Herring a slightly inferior man over one
 snore able. The man who gets the job &l&usual1y is the one who has the most & friends among the stockholders. Of z course, in many cases, plaster" is \ offered the deposed chieftain in the shape "A of smaller post, possibly a vice pres- M idency, with a relatively meager salary, \ and little more more than honorary du- ties, but a man who has been master
 generally has much pride and is apt to
 say no to such a proposition.
 Effect of Merger
 There was consolidation of two great
 boiler interests not long ago. In all the
 country. the east and middle west at
 least, there were only two companies that
 made large boilers and were in a posi- tion to go after the big contracts, such as 300 to 5000 horsepower plants. The two H companies had been fighting battle roy H al for years for the cream of the trade, M which was very considerable Fighting s costs money, and one day the principal
 stockholders realized that meSger of
 
 S S.Sproftable; V so they went to work to < bring it about
 e5 The consolidation went through. The HA two opposing presidents were giants in X the trade. One had the fame of being
 the biggest boiler man in the world" {" gaIIis rival measured close up to him, and
 4had been getting an enormous amount s ' of business also. So keen rival had t3F he proved that his company thought him N cheap at $5o00O a year. One of the other H of these two big men had to go. The VA stockholders selected the biggest boiler
 man in the world'' for the presidency 2 of the merged concerns. The other big S man is out of a job for the first time since he was a boy. He, probably will ts be idle for the rest of his life. He Is Al too high-priced for a small concern, Nand there is no prospect for a large a4enough one being organized.
 W Scores of men of just this type have #Abeen eliminated from the business world " sin the last few years. Many of these
 smen have been leokd upon in their day z las among the great industrial leaders of Aathe country. It is pity, of course, that Asuch capable executives should be out or ' harness, but there are literally no places h for them. They may be in the flower of V afheir ability when they are sentenced to M husiness exile but that makes no diff fls Terence. .r
 sA when J. P. Morgan and B. H. ~Harri- HHHfnan were the great players III tuc Sdiile of railroad merging there was not year \ swhen there were not several shake-ups
 *among railroad presidents which left e all. but the few fortunate ones jobless. ' \ Even the little heads of the jerkwater
 roads could not go back to being division snperintendents of larger ones, and most Is Of them quit railroading.
 Sf Railroad Presidents Luck x AdThere is no one who is so dreadfully X y Y,,arooned as the railroad president who \ IS out of employment. There is the case. Y flor instance, of man who was president [Mpe one, of the biggest railroads in the @4ccuntry for 9 years. He got a salary
 of $50, 900 or s75,000 but he lived up to
 Every cent of it. He is out of a job now. <i4Ie has spent the best years of his life Xgsh the place he held so long. He cannot |,Xske any lesser position and is on the a&ocks.
 l # Now and then one of these big rail- | ,4oad presidents retires to the semi-ob- |fcurity of private life and becomes a tconsulting expert for Q great banking H house or group of financiers at much x f1arger, salary than he ever received be- ;ssS{ore Being railroad consulting ex- # Inert is a very nice job. The man who
 holds it is more powerful than the ra F gs cad presidents themselves. It is %rs R Rtopinion, to a great extent, which decides 5s3tyho shall be retained and who shall be xHflei go when a merger occurs.
 M The railroad purchasing agents have BlNsuffered also, and many men who got ls$10.oO0 a year are out of job. Where a system absorbs several smaller Fliiines about the first order that goes out ! eds the one firing the old purchasing # fA gents and adding their duties to those Nff2of the chief purchasing agent of the en- .2ftre system The man who has always E| E|{sbought goods, but never has sold them, |y1xis about as useless specialist as there lE3Ais when he Is looking for a job. NH Another class of big business man who iBSfis adrift these days is the $15,0o0 to $20 N boo year sales manager or technical ex- NYypert Here is another set of cases of too A New jobs to go around. Men of this M seort have. quite as much difficulty in |MNgetting placed again when a consolidation N*throws them out of work as the s5O 900 WY a year chief executives. They. are spe- N clalists. and for years they have studied
 and bought along only one line. They 1 know this from to 2. but when 1t
 comes to shifting into new line they