Iron County record. [volume] (Cedar City, Utah) 1893-1982, 1917-11-23

home to us and we are making real effort to re-
duce consumption, through our efforts to increase
production are being seriously handicapped by the
high price of labor.
Immediately after war was declared the Pres
ident warned the Country that everyone should
produce more and consume less. The idea that
business was to be suddenly reduced by wave of,
economy was a shock to business men and the cry
business as usual was spread over the Country
and caused the Presidents appeal to be forgotten
Not only are people spending as usual but many
conscientiously believe it their duty so to do
Every dollar spent means the consumption of
labor We shall not be far wrong if we say that
every four dollars spent consumes days labor
and that every twelve hundred dollars spent con-
sumes years labor. war expenditure of twelve
billion dollars will consume the labor of ten mil
lion people; twenty-five per cent of our total labor
supply. This added demand comes during the
greatest labor famine in our history, which has
increased commodity prices eighty-fve per cent
since 1914
We have reached point where the increasing
demand reduces the efficiency of labor and thereby
reduces the supply, and we are facing further
rise in commodity prices, perhaps to exceed pres
ent conditions in England, where prices up one
hundred and twenty per cent.
The most effective remedy is to decrease con-
sumption, and it is. imperative that everyone
should make a drastic reduction in personal ex-
penditures. The example must be set by the rich,
but every man, woman and child must be drawn
into the movement until patriotic economy be-
comes the greatest fad the country has ever
known
Our young men who try to avoid military SER
vice are "slackers." Every one of us who will not
economic to help the is Stacker" Who
will fail to spend less when he realizes that every
four dollars saved is days labor contributed to
the war? 1t is not question of whether your in
come justifes an expenditure, but whether the
country can afford to let you spend.
Even to prevent hardship we have no right to
spend to keep people in their usual employment,
for only by a process of readjustment can we OBJ
tain the labor necessary for the war. Already the
Government is resorting to price fixing and other
dangerous experiments because we can no longer
submit to the law of supply and demand We can
not increase supply, but we can reduce demand
that the available supply shall meet our needs and
so keep prices within bounds.
With two million men in environments or in
tents there are houses enough for the rest of us.
We can reduce the famine in wool and cotton by
wearing our old clothes We can stop the pur-
chase of automobiles, so that the factories and
their operatives may produce motor trucks, air.
craft and munitions. We can use the automobiles
we now have less freely and save gasoline. We
can reduce the number of our servants and let our
wives and daughters do more of the work. We
can do away with the wastefulness of charity en-
tertainments if we go less to the theatre and give
the money saved to charity.
The real horrors in Europe are not on the fir
ing line, but amongst the civil population, who are
pinched for the necessities of life and in many
cases dying of starvation If each one of us is not
willing to make sacrifices for the war; Germany
was right when she characterized us a Nation of
Slackers. Everett Morss, Boston.