The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-07-08
For the Good of
 the Community

l zation to give his most careful attention and study. Iconsider it an accurate andy sis of conditions in this country and want each man to absorb it and put it's con- clusions into practice immediately "When you read the many conflicting press reports from day to day, do you sort of wonder where you are at and what's going to happen, and when the break is going to come?
 Let's list the items that go to make bad or good business t6 see where we stand "On the debit side, chargeable to old man Pessimism and General Depression are the following:
 DEBTS
 Coal and copper mining almost at standstil
 Building pretty nearly as bad. Steel industry running at 60 per cent capacity.
 Railroads losing money at the rate of S80O,000000 year and another rate in crease imminent.
 Heavy taxation-high cost of living high labor costs industrial unrest-un- employment.
 Hand to mouth buying because of high costs and fear of price declines-fear of deflatiOn.
 Import embargoes by England, France and Italy
 Premium on the dollar in those countries as a further brake on our export trade. Likewise the difficulty of financing such trade. But here art the
 CREDITS
 Retail buying the heaviest ever known-good business in automobiles rubber and leather goods, and many lines of luxures-all indicating free buying and an ample buying power on the part of the people.
 Crops-Last report 100.5 per cent, point never before reached The wheat crop alone will give the farmer buying power of nearly 21a billions; corn over billions to say noth ng of hay oats, cotton, etc. Were nothing else in sight, this would in nor nal times be considered the basis for an exceed ing fly prosperous year.
 Wartime repression of demand to be satisfied depleted markets to be reStOcked-war's de- struction to be made good.
 Building rapidly reviving-over two billions needed to catch up with the countrys needs. The financing of the railroads requirements being arranged-200,00 tons steel rails now be- ing contracted for.
 Road building proceeding in many states aided by an $1OO,0O0,O0O appropriation from the federal government.
 Smallest number of failures in history Unemployment declining -bolshevism under control.
 Italy Rumania, Greece, Poland, Czecho-Slo- vaka, Finland Belgium and France now have
  many millions.
 Foreign competition will not be an important factor for sometime because costs in Europe just now are higher than they are in this country on most manufactured articles.
 Except perhaps temporarily or in isolated cases, don't the credits seem to outweigh the debits? Then why the doubt, the hesitation?
 Because many people are still waiting for price slump For months the economists have preached deflation-but did you notice that Dun's index figure of averaged commodity prices on May 1st was only four points below May 1st 1918 and 2.4 points higher than it was two months before?
 Why rising instead of falling prices? Because apparently the credits for prosperity and good business are pulling stronger than the debits- prosperity is coming and prosperity is always ac- companied by rising prices (see Babsons). With the demand so great that food prices are rising instead of falling, labor cannot suffer re- duction-wages are going up in many sections of the country.
 Andswith 85 to 90 per cert of the cost of the average finished prodr gong back through all the various materials dairea to produce it until you get to the iron, ole coal etc) represented by labor, how can there be price slump?
 Educate your customers to tlis viewpoint and have them in turn educate tnei trade