New-York tribune., 1918-07-06
involuntary Prohteering

Consider the price Of wheat-$2.20
bushel. 1t was fixed by the President
himself. majority Of the United
States Senate has voted to raise this
price to $3.50. This is nearly two and
one-half times what WAS considered
fair price for wheat as late as 1916,
three years ago. Why does no one
charge shameless profteering" mere?
In the month of April corn was SELL
ing in the New York market on parity
with wheat-$2.25 q bushel. In many
localities it has sold higher than wheat.
The normal price is a little over one
half that of wheat. Up to 1915 10 or
so cents was considered handsome price.
To-day it is nearly three times this
This price for corn means directly, or
through the price Of meat, an extra tax
Of three or four billions this year on
the people Of the United States,
"pocketed" by the farmers. Why does
no one charge profteering here?
Down to and into 1915 pig iron was
selling as low as S14 ton. To-day it
is fixed by government edict at around
$34 ton. If this is profiteering, why
are not the President and the War In
dustries Board cited?
Ten years ago copper Corner" ran
the price Of copper up to 26 cents That
was an unheard Of price, and the copper
pool burst, with ruinous loss to the
men who composed it. To-day the gov
ernment fixes the price at 26 cents,
price that means 100 per cent or
more profit to many large producers.
Yet no one charges that the government
is in league with the copper miners to
swindle the public.
Six months or year after the war
began cotton was begging in the mar
ket at and 8 cents a pound. To-day
it is selling in the New York market
for 80 cents more than four times the
price of three years ago. Why no charge
Of prcfteering here?
So we might 60 on through the list
Everywhere you go it is the same story;
every one is receiving from 100 to 800
per cent more than he received three
years ago. The total of these added re-
ceipts mounts into the billions. They
mean unconscionable profits to 20 or 30
millions of people. Are all these
"profteers"?
Nor is it any different with vast
army of wage earners. Last year in the
construction of the cantonments the gov
ernment paid as high as SO and $40
day for carpenters; other workers in
proportion. In the munition factories
farmhands and domestic servants who
never made over $50 or $40 a month in
their lives are receiving $3.50 day and
upward. Coal miners have to be per-
suaded to work for patriotic reasons.
Money is no longer sufficient incentive.
Are they also "prohteers"?
Those who know anything about eco
nomics, who have even rudmentary un-
derstanding of the problems involved
know that these soaring prices, these
"scandalous profits" are due not as the
Federal Trade Commission declares-to
the exigences Of the war-but to a redun-
dance of money and credit As Profess
sor Kemmerer showed so clearly in an
article published in The Tribune recently.
while the actual volume of business. tho
total of goods produced, has increased by
perhaps rs per cent, the volume of cur
rency and credit has increased by so or
IS per cent; from which fact rapid in
crease of prices inevitably results.
Only indirectly is the war responsible
for the present high cost of living. Yet
the report Of the Federal Trade Commits
sion would put the whole responsibility
upon the war and the "ruthless profit
eers" who take advantage of it. The
result is to create in the minds of mill
ions of well-meanng and fairly intel
ligent people a feeling of bitterness. and.
inevitably, a subconscious resentment
against the war. High prices on the one
hand, high taxes on the other, do not
create cool and reasoning frame of