New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-08-26
.FAU URE, OF PRICE FIXING IS
INEVITABLE BECAUSE MAXIMUM
OUTPUT DEPENDS ON HIGH PRICES
The Conclusion Analyst From Study the History OF Attempted Fnce
Control and Of the Theorists Amazing Lack Of Economic
Understanding in Washington

eighteen months the price Of crude
oil in Oklahoma had risen from
around 40 cents a barrel to an aver
age of four times this. 1t even
reached 81 a barrel. Those who had
large holdings of oil made perfectly
wonderful winnings. One man is re-
ported to have cleared S35,O0O,OOO
in fifteen months. It is said that
within this period every day has
seen the creation of a new oil mill
ionaire. But the star winner OF
them all has been Standard Oil. Its
profits on its actual holdings of
stored oil must have run into hun
dreds of millions, and, of course,
John D. was the greatest beneficiary
of all. And yet, with few stray
yelps here and there, there has
hardly been a Congressman or food
dictator to rise up to denounce the
outrageous" prices for oil. Why?
Simply because this same crude
oil has come to furnish the chief
pleasure and convenience to mill
ions upon millions Of people, and
even the widest price fixer in
Washington, or out, is aware that
even these highly inflated prices
have failed to keep oil production at
its 1916 level. Even the blindest OF
them knows that the maintenance OF
this level, or anywhere near 1t, is
dependent upon constant eXplora-
ton and the incessant opening OF
new wells. and that any attempt to
curb present prices would instantly
result in a reduction of the present
supply. And because this is as PLAIN
as a pikestaff to every motor car
owner and oil user in the United
States there has practically been no
proposition to fix the price Of oil.
The utmost that has been proposed
has been to commander The supply
and shut off the auto users, and that
is precisely what the owners OF
million or two Fords would not
stand. So far as the government is
concerned, the price of oil can go
to 81 a barrel in Oklahoma and
gasolene to so cents gallon, and
Standard Oil can make a billion
out of it, and law to fix the price
would not gain dozen votes in Con-
gress.
II is strange how in some cases
our vision can be really clear.
Food Supply May
Be Endangered
But it is just as sure that If the
endeavor to fix a price on pig iron
and steel gets through the result
will be a decline in pig iron and
steel production, for price fixing, to
the price fxer, means always price
lowering, and price lowering can
only mean less iron. If Washington
can set a price upon copper, copper
production is going to follow. And
if Mr.. Hoover sets a price on wheat
or corn that is within a mile of sat
isfactory to the average price fixer
il will result in lowered produc-
ton Of wheat and corn next year
Just when we may need it most.
And all this, no matter whether
Mr.. Gary and the rest of his steel
committee and Mr.. Ryan and all
the great copper producers and the
most friendly friends of the farmers
agree to the proposed prices. For
this reason: These prices might be
satisfactory, and, what is more,
uery profitable to Mr.. Gary's cor
poration and Mr.. Ryan's companies,
and to the Dakota wheat farmers
and the Iowa corn growers. And, in
spite of that production will be
Io1Cer, because these prices will not
mean a profit to the men on the edge
OF the game, as it were. These
prices will not open up the aban-
Goned fields of New York and New
England, nor their abandoned iron
mines, nor be profitable to the hun
dreds of small copper companies
which cannot make copper now UNI
der present labor conditions at less
than 20 cents to % cents a pound.
Labor grows scarcer day by day.
Think of it a moment. Some of
the largest copper mines of New
Mexico and Old Mexico are now
paying s. a day or more to their
men for practically a seren-hoW
dan. That is, the men are paid for
their time from the mine collar
down and back again, with time for
lunch counted in. Mexican "greas-
ers" and almost any kind of "wop"
getting IS day for about two
thirds the time they are usually ac-
customed to work, and now being or