The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-04-12
HIGH COST CHEAP DoLLARs.

Build now and build rapidly is the
advice given by United States Senator
Underwood of Alabama to the real
estate people of Birmingham in a re-
cent address. Reviewing the whole
situation, Senator Underwood said:
I'VE are not on a gold basis No
body tried to get gold out of the treas
ury during the war, and if they had,
they would not have gotten it. The
government had to have vast deal of
paper money; the government needed
it, you needed it. At the beginning of
the war you had few hundred mill
lion gold certificates and treasury
notes, but I doubt if a search of the
pockets of all the men present would
reveal one gold certificate. Federal
reserve notes, based on somebody's
credit, have taken their place. At one
time there were $3,O0O,0 100000 of fed
eral reserve bank notes in circulation"
Senator Underwood mentioned these
facts as showing that they all had
tendency to decrease the value of the
dollar, and then he added:
Building materials are not up in
price-at least all of them are not
but the dollar has gone down and will
stay down for a long time. There may
be some falling off, but as long as you
have the great amount of dollars to
pay more for what you need you lose
nothing by the higher values of ma
terials. Persons who will not buy be-
cause they have to pay more dollars
Fnow are taking the wrong view. They
are measuring by the wrong standard,
by the wrong yardstick.'
~ In the course of his address Senator
Underwood urged that building oper-
atoms should be vigorously pressed,
and he claimed that it is not an unsafe
business proposition to buy materials
and build now.
The Manufacturers Record which
takes tie same views as those ex-
pressed by Senator Underwood says:
We are III a period of great world in
flation and prices must of necessity
remain high under this condition.
Wages must be high. the cost of food
stuffs must continue high, and this
means that building material and all
other work must be high.
The effect of world initiation must
not be overlooked. In the closing
days of the Confederacy. when paper
money had been issued to an enor>
nous extent, calico dress or a pair
of common shoes sold at from $500 to
$500 each, and other things in proper
ton. This was initiation carried to
the extreme. but all initiation such as
that we now have in this and all other
countries has the same tendency to in
crease wages and the price of all
things when measured by the number
of dollars that must be used~i in pay
ment therefor.
The Record, however. goes farther
than the position taken by Senator IN
/ derwood. We have insisted. it says,
that it is the duty of every man and
every corporation contemplating build
ing and able to finance the operation
I to build now without waiting for lower
wages or lower materials. Broadly
4 speaking, much lower wages cannon
come unless there come a period OF
depression which would create more
social unrest and disturbances and fbe
productive of so much harm that the
cost to the individual and to the entire
nation would infinitely exceed the cost
of building operations today at prices
higher than those that formerly pre-
vailed, and higher than some people
are hoping may prevail a year or two
thence.