The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1919-09-03
HOW THE CONSUMER BOOSTS PRICES
tLiterary Digest, Aug. 800


York restaurant the other day. finding roast BEEF
listed at 80 cents a portion. Up he got Out hi
walked. Across the street he purchased crackers
and milk for twenty-five and made his meal
and the New York Illustrated Daily News remarks
that this sort of thing would bring the profiteel
down to basis of fair dealing faster than all the
Investigations congress can conduct" while the
New York Times declares that III nobody paid the
prices, il few paid them that the stocks would
be left the sellers hands prices would fal
promptly enough However. 1T Is policy too many
Americans appear to have set their hearts on avoid
ing. No matter how outrageous the swindle. VIC
Tins come nocking. To cite but few Of the all bu
incredible instances noted by the newspapers there
are domestic servants who buy silk stockings a.
Sc pair, working who willingly pay $12 fol
silk shirt Louisiana lumberjacks who sport u
neclties. People who In the past rarely, If ever
visited summer resorts spending money freely
there, and in especially fragrant cases one hears
of their buying doughnuts at $1.20 dozen, cake
at "a loaf. Meanwhile the 1900 million
aires created by the 1--WE borrow the figures
from recent Washington dispatch) conduct
ing perfect carnival Of frenzied buying. II the
steel copper coal, and lumber industries are stfl
in the Dumps" there -four major lines of bust
ness activity which report great prosperity-jew-
elry, musical instruments, automobiles and tobacco
non essentials called" and scandalousy higf
prices are deterrents. On the contrary. they
seem shed additional luster costly things we
are told that in Boston the dealers put shoes or
could dispose of Them customers demanded
q more expensive grade. So there you are will
ing victims always find robbers" says the Wash
ington Herald, continuing:
THE American spirit apparently finds it diff
ficult differentate between being a good fellow
and being good thing; between easy going and
an easy mark.
(which say. that reason prices arr
high the buying public persists In pay
ing price without complaint.
And IN buying things it doesn't need
And exorbitant prices.
THE cheaper cuts OF meat do not move any
faster when the better cuts double in price.
SHOP girls shod in the latest style in shoes
whether they cost five dollars fifteen dollars
the pair
.The travelling public demands the best the
finest hotels have to offer. whether the price Dc
three dollars day thirty dollars.
"The cafes and cabarets and grills and similar
resorts are as thronged and the cheaper res
taurants, where the serving of food is the man
business do gain in popularity.
Nobody that is anybody quits Joy-rlding Wneh
tires are boosted so per cent
whether gasoline be fifteen cents or fifty
gallon, the country roads are crowded on SUNDAY
THE only institution not patronized in a period
of inflated prices is the savings bank, ana ths
tax is the more dense the crowd becomes around
the counter.
mo other nation does this.
NO other nation afford to do it.
1T is to be doubted if even this nation car
afford do it,
Here and there newspaper bids spenders ioof
ahead. when the day Of reckoning and RETROSPECT
ton comes says the Rock Island CIll) Union, W.
will wonder why did not apply the brakes be-
fore we hit the down grade Sometime the mer
and women who the extent of their present
incomes will count the years they were the VIC
Tins Of the hypnotic haze lost"
What is it really. that explains the mania foi
frenzied buying? rebound after wartime econ
omy? J. Ogden Armour believes so. and says the
United States is ION extravagant drunk Then
too it difficult for the citizen to realize
that dollar for dollar, he is twice as poor as be-
fore the war: saws the Portland Oregonian, 1.-TWO
dollars does not represent much more than on'
dollar did five years ago but the larger NUMBER o.
dollars tempts man to indulge In Injuries VIII
which he formerly dispensed" And we find a Iur-
Their attempt at explanation the Des Moines Cap
ital, which contends that
excepting up with the Joneses' is one Of the
main contributing causes of the high cost or living
Mr.. Jones' having been engaged in some business
connected with the war has made a little money
and proceeds to splurge little. Mr.. Smith, who
has plodded along at the same pace, with reason
able raise of wages, will not be outdone by Mr.
Jones' and attempts to live on the same plan as ms
newly prosperous neighbor Mrs. Smith notices
that Mrs. Jones has employed maid and more
fashionable dressmaker. and, fearing the other
neighbors in the same apartment may get the ioes
that the Smith exchequer does not measure up witt
that of the Jones's, she also annexes a maid and
Increases her dress allowance. The Smith menags
increases its budget and lowers its bank balance
In the excitement Of their affluence the Jones
family acquires piutocratc disdain for the dol
lar sign, while the Smith family becomes unhap-
PLY cognzant of it's limitations of purchase Both
families headed for the same abyss. but the
Smiths will reach 1t first"
But what shall say OF the neighbor who
still unfortunate than Smith. draws pretty
much the pay before the war? Says the
Baltimore Manufacturers Record:
ION the other hand there millions OF
teachers and preachers, and clerks and others OF
moderate fixed income whose salaries whose in
come from investments have not increased in pro-
portion to the cost of living They are the ones
who suffering most, but they the ones who
ar he at nd I'M