The Clio messenger. (Clio, Mich.) 1907-current, 1919-09-11
SKY HIGH PRICES
FOLLOW BIG WARS
CONOMIST GIVES FIGURES TO
PROVE 1T
avs Lower Prices are Sure to Come
But May Take Twenty Years
to Reach Old Level

ity, commands such wide attention in
our country as that relating to the
"high cost of living" Various reas-
ons are advanced by various people
for the unexampled level of prices
that now obtain. Some say they are
due to the Vaccinations of the capt.
alistic class, some to the high wages
that labor is demanding and receiv-
ing and still others aver that the far
mer, producer of practically all the
food and clothing, in its raw state,
is getting too much for his products.
As to corporations, they may have
manipulated prices artifcially to
some extent, and the same will have
to be said Of every organization,
financial, industrial or Agricultural
which has .een attempting to fix the
price or any Of the necessaries Of
life, but going back to natural causes
for the high prices we are experience
ing, it is interesting to read the opin-
ion of Mark Sullivan, an economist OF
note, as published in recent issue of
Golfers. Says Mr.. Sullivan:
"At the beginning of war prices
start upward; they keep on going so
as long as the war lasts; some time
near the end of the war-before the
end as to some commodities-prices
reach their peak. Then prices start
downward; they keep on going down.
ward for a long time; for consider
able periods the descent is slow and
gradual; for shorter periods they go
down precipitately, and people say
there is panic; every once in a
while they rise little. But for
: twenty-five years after great war
the general trend of the prices of
everything is slowly and steadily
downward. That is the sum total of
all the science and all the books.
"What the people want to know is
Just how soon after this war the
present price of living will start
downward. And the people are loud
ly insistent about wanting to know.
Vice President George f. Rogers, of
the National City Bank of New
York, told the Iowa Bankers Asso-
, ciation, one day last month, that he
was convinced that the rising costs
of living has honeycombed the whole
social structure with suspicion and
discomfort
"This suspicion, this discomfort, is
universal. it is worse in nearly ev-
cry other country in the world than
it is with US. What the sleeping,
eating and dressing world wants to
know exclaims The Detroit News,
truculently, 'is whether the cost of
necessities is justified The impli-
cation is universal that somebody is
to blame
Assuming that the government
can't and won't do much and probab-
ly won't do anything, what will hap
pen? Assuming that the policy is
followed of letting the law of supply
and demand work out freely, what
will be the course Of events?
"Inevitably the prices of goods ulti-
mately will turn downward.
eff we are willing to take expert
ence as our guide, the best that is
available is what took place in the
United States during and after the
Civil War and what took place in
England during and after the Napo-
leonic Wars.
"The Napoleonic Wars lasted from
1871 until 1914. The course that
prices took during that period has
been recorded in what is known as
sJevons's Index Number of commod-
ity prices. Thesnumber is obtained
by taking an average of the prices of
a large variety of goods, including
wheat, corn, oats and other farm
products; beef, pork, mutton and
other meats; iron and other metals
wool, cotton and great many 9TH
ers. It will be observed that at the
height of the war prices were almost
twice what they were in the begin
ming; but that six years after the
End of the war, prices were back at
,heir pre-war level:
179O-146, 1795-196, 1900
,sS, 18O5-220, 1810-262, 1916
o. 1821-147, 1829-132, 1888
20, h843-115, 1849-107.
= Flour, when the Civil War began,
$5.35 barrel. In 1868 it went
S6.O5. In the last year Of the war
reached $1,000. The next year
fell to $S.75, but little later it
ent up again, and in 1868 was
D.5O. That is to say, three years
after the war was over the price had
receded from the high price it reach
ed during the war, but was still near
ly twice its pre-war price
"Corn started in 1851 at ~ cents.
Il ended the war at $1.90. A year
later it was down to 95c. Then it
ebegan to rise again, although it never
again reached as high as $1.9O. Its
: price in 1868 was 1876.
Leather began the Civil War at