The labor standard., 1919-09-01
SEVEN TESTS OF RAILROAD
 MERIT'' IS GREATEST ISSUE
Scientific, Non-P Partisan Investigation of Gigantic x. and Complex Problem Recently Made by s'fs United States Tariff Commissioner David J.
 Lewis, Father of Parcel POst'

l OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES w. hapcer, director of the National School of So- has issued the following report: Our greatest domestic issue is now being taken up in Congress. Two mil lions of employees and one-twelfth of the peoples total wealth are bound up in our railway transportation system which is the indispensable agent of communication and prosperity of mod ern civilization. Upon the efficiency. justice and equality of service of this, the worlds greatest transportation system, depends in large measure the growth and democracy of the Amer ican people.
 Every pound of meat we buy, every can of soup or salmon, every pair of everything we use, is made more ex- pensive by the railway transportation charge, or "tax". This is one of the largest and most unobserved taxes we pay, and it has been several times as high in the past as it should have been. It is the reduction of this un- justly high tax and the provision of a unified, efficient transportation sys- tenn for the country, intimately cor related with our water and other sys- tems of transportation, that is the prime problem to-day before Con- gress.
 Nearly all important countries of the world now have public ownership of the rails and the other principal means of transportation and commu- nication, with the exception of Great Britain, now in the process of nation alizing them. A vast amount of valu- able experience on the relative desira- bility of public and private ownership has been purchased at high price in other countries. One would think that Congress would not only hold hearings on the subject, listening to those who volunteered to offer advice, but would have some of the ablest experts of the country studying and reporting on this most important matter even as the President has had force of the ablest experts of the nation studying for months the basic facts of the peace problem. But any one who is drawn-out hearings on the railroads, by both Senate and House Committees, knows that <s~-orts of the investiga- ton of the relative success or failure of public and private ownership in the countries where both have been tried have been conspicuous by their ab- sence, and that any close questioning of congressman on this problem shows that they have but vague notions about this most important matter. A scientific, non-partisan investiga- tion of this gigantic and complex problem has been recently made by David J. Lewis, of the U. s. Tariff Commission. MT. Lewis is popularly known as the Father of the Parcels Post".
 4o1, C., data gathered by the Bureau of Rail- way Economies supported in Wash ington by the railways themselves. He used principally the figures derived from government and other reports for the period immediately preceding the war when the world was at com parative peace. He could, therefore, hardly be accused of using biased or incorrect data.
 In order to analyze the problem of public versus private ownership and operation into it's elements and actu- ally to test the two types of railway ownership and operation, MT. Lewis has worked out seven standard tests of railway efficiency and applies them to the railways of about thirty lead ing countries of the world, all the data which the Bureau of Railway Econom- ics could secure for the year 1913, the last year before the war.
 These, stated here in brief, are as follows:
 1. What is the efficiency of the
 railway with respect to the cap
 ital invested, (a) it's security,
 (b) the constancy of it's remu-
 neration, and Co the amplitude
 and readiness of supply :?
 g., What Is it's economic efficiency
 with respect (a) to the proper
 use of it's rolling stock, (b) the
 routing of it's freight, (c) the
 coordination of it's carriers with
 water transportation, and (d)
 the simplicity of rates and fs
 cal practice?
 3. What is the efficiency of it's per
 sonnel with respect (a) to work
 accomplished, (b) to relative
 exemption from accident, (c) to
 improvement or deterioration on passing from private to public
 ownership and operation?
 4. What is its freight-carrying eff
 fciency with respect (a) to the
 movement of potential freight
 traffic, (b) to costs per capita
 and per ton, (c) to costs per
 unit of service, and (d) to fast
 freight, "pick up", and delivery
 service?
 5. What is it's efficiency in passen-
 ger service with respect (a) to
 the movement of potential pas
 senger traffic in the nation, (b)
 to cost per unit of service, (c)
 to adjustment of rates to ser
 vices, (d) to the tendency to-
 ward rate reductions, Gel to
 popular passenger rates, (f) to
 feeding the train, sleeping fa-
 cilities, and frequently of ser
 vice?
 6. What is it's efficiency in railway
 development with respect (a) to
 extensions, (b) to ameliorating
 industrial 'depressions, (c) to
 the utilization of waterways,
 (d to method of acquisition,
 and finally Gel to method of
 management?
 '. What is it's governmental effici-