The Twin Falls times. [volume] (Twin Falls, Idaho) 1905-1916, 1912-04-12
A BUSINESS MAN VISITS WASH
INGTON.

Washington recently, and becoming
interested in the business side of the
departments and bureaus (whose
morning and evening", he learned q
few facts like these:
/. That if a bureaus supply of sta.
tionery runs out, and it's quarterly
limit of expenditure has already been
reached, there is no official alterna-
tive but to allow clerks to warm their
chairs and idle for as many days as
the quarter may yet have to run. Buy
ing stationery necessary to keep them
at work would put the chief into the
penitentiary!
| ,. That if department executive
| finds a labor-saving device or SNrs-
tenn which would at once make the
labor of dozen clerks unnecessary
tat a saving of perhaps $500 a week. ,
he is prohibited from acting. at least
until the next quarter perhaps until
the next year. He is compelled by
law to hire a specified number Of
clerks at a specified salary, come
what may,
8. That, though an executive rea-
Lies perfectly we'll that he might
save twenty-five per cent of his sup
ply costs by purchasing a years sup
ply, or more, at the quantity rate
familiar to all business, he cannot
act to make the saving for the Gov
eminent, for he is compelled by law
to buy Just enough for the current
quarter-at the higher rate, of
course,
The business man, on learning
these facts land many more like
them), was positively aghast. He
made the people who told him prove
it, which they did. And then the
business man, who, prior to his
Washington visit. had been unable to
visualize the vast and awing con-
crete business side of the Govern
ment, began at once to take an inter
COT III II WHICH he Ildu never DSIDIG
felt 1t had touched him on common
ground. washington" to him was no !
longere marble-halIed political Val
halla. seen like a Sky-thrOne from
affair, but flesh-and-blood business
proposition" which by his personally |
conducted departmental visit became |
W., oil ,1a /, AL
lOng-cOntinued and temperamental |
contempt for politics" he actually
felt the startings of an ambition to |
run it. why" he said, with the |
air of one making a great discovery, |
the President is simply the head of
a tremendous big business.'
With this new conception of our
government, the whole Washington
cleared up in his mind
and he tackled every phase
of it with zest and familiarity. But
every time he attacked with merited
Scorn and contempt a condition such
as outlined above Ito him the embo-
diment of inefficiency and absurdity)
he came up against department men
who admitted what he said and more.
He found them matchmaking the
same things he condemned, for the
most part; willing to increase eff
cheney, and having practical plans all
worked out on tap in their pigeon
holes.
He saw clerical work done in a
manner and with wastefulness of
duplication such as he had not
thought any modern office was guilty
Of. Yet, as ripple in the sea of in
he was shown how even
in department greatly handicapped
by being under the wing of the Trea-
Sury a few things were happening.
Until recently eighteen typists had
been kept at work recopying each
month $4,000 names of workers to
whom pay checks were to be sent
Each month they had copied the same
names over and over again, and work {
ng beside them had been two other
clerks to proof-read over and over
again the work as it was typed to
see that no errors were made. The l
'ay-sheet had, of course. represent {
ID Il further duplication Of this work,
md the checks themselves still an {
'ther. Now an ordinary addressing- {
machine has brought all three opera |
ions into one, dispensed with three &c
onrths of the work, and made proof d
eading unnecessary. "SpIendid." q
commented the business man. 81 sup g
'ose you discharged the clerks that q
week, and have been saving $500 i
week at least" His informant smiled /
S he reached for the law under j
which he works, making it compul-
DRY for him to have employed ex- S
Gu 4