The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-10-15
MAGNITUDE OF
 MOTOR INDUSTRY
BY HOLLAND

New York, October 1A-Ten or
 twelve years ago George Westinghouse i had occasion to- look into the auto
 an apparatus for resisting by means
 of air pressure the shock oF' pounding which those. who have ridden over a
 rough road have experienced. MT. | Westinghouse caused an estimate to be made of the amount of money ex pended in the previous year in the up- 1 keep of automobiles He learned that approximately s300.0O0.0oO were ex pended for this purpose. Looking into l the future he said that with the in- l crease in the automobile industry the | probabilities were strong that within | 10 or 12 years the p-keep alone of | American automobiles would be consid- erably in excess of $500, ,000.000.
 MT. Westinghouse also predicted an | increase in the capital invested in the | rnanufac cture of automobiles that with | in few years the aggregate capital | thus invested would be greater thar ! that which represented any but two I or three American industries. He ! thought the time might come when I the. United States Steel corporation would find itself outclassed so far as capital is concerned by the automo- bile industry taken as whole Of
 course he bore in mind that the Steel corporation is single unit in the en- tire steel industry of the United States. whereas the automobile industry as
 whole represents a good many in-
 dividual corporations. Nevertheless, he
 thought it is fair to compare the
 amount of money invested in this i'm
 dustry with the capital which the Steel
 corporation represents.
 Were MT. Westinghouse now alive
 Q hn al to trr aplr fn tha
 prediction which he made some 10
 years ago and find that it has been
 vindicated. He propab ply would re-
 peat question which he asked at
 that time which was this: "Where Is
 all the money coming from which is
 invested and is to be invested in the
 automobile industry? Will this invest
 ment mean withdrawal of capital from
 other American industries?' He
 thought that time alone could ans yer
 the questions.
 GREAT SINGLE INDUSTRY
 It has been possible to obtain au
 thentic statistics which tell of the stu
 pendous growth of the automobile in- dustry, especially within the past 10
 or 12 years Partly new wealth, partly reinvested wealth. has been to the ex-
 tent of $1,S00, 900, 900 invested in cap ttal engaged in the manufacture of automobiles in the United States. And yet, so far as any one can judge, this enormous investment has not percepti-
 bly affected the employment of capital in other industries and particularly in certain ones that are new as for in stance, in the recent large expansion of the American oil industry.
 One Suggestion recently made refer ence to the effect of this capital in ex- banding other and incidental industries in the United States. If all the capital invested in the industrial banks of the United States as recently as 1917 were compared with the capitalization of the automobile industry, it would be discovered that these national banks which. as a whole, cover the entire | United States have aggregated capital | ,ess by S250,000.000 than the capital l of the automobile industry. However, | on the other hand. it must be remem- | hered that the resources of these banks | vastly exceed the combined resources | of the automobile corporations.
 AND RAILROADS |
 The great railroads of the United | States have been expanding or have been established since 1860, two of 1 them since 1S66 They have. therefore, | had an average life of nearly 60 years They have developed the wealth of | the country by amounts so large that | the human mind cannot grasp the mag 1 nitude of the figures. Their boDded | uept III the aggregate Is almost equal | to the war debt of the United States | Nevertheless. the capital engaged In | the automobile industry almost all cs | It invested in the past 10 or 12 years, | is larger than the capital of the Penn sylvs.nia railroad. which is nearly S500,- 100000. and in fact, larger than the | combined capital of the New York Cen tral, the Pennsylvania, the Chicago | Northwestern. and the Chicago Mil Waukee and St Paul
 It is larger than the combined capi- tai stock of the S5 standard Oil com- | panies. Recently one of the ablesl leaders in the oil industry stated that notwithstanding the magnitude of the amount invested in the automobile In- dustry. nevertheless. from one point of view the industry is not to be listed with the five leading industries of the United States. steel iron, cotton, cop per. agricultural and oil These are elemental industries. he said. The au- E tomobile is not nelemental indus- | try Taken by itself however, it com- pares favorably with any other Ameri- | can industry. And if the United States | Steel Corporation is omitted from the survey. then it can be accurately as serted that the automobile industry has | so grown in the past 10 or 12 years | that its capital now exceeds that of Ii
 ID Ur,e M