The Mena weekly star., 1920-12-23
Public Works AS
Panic Prevention

Jim Smith, mill hand, is out Of a
Job. The textile manufacturer, his
employer, has been compelled to clay
him off" for an indefinite period be-
cause of lack of orders. The manu-
facturer has human sympathies and is
sorry for Jim Smith; but he is vic
tim of circumstances which he and
Jim as individuals are unable to. con-
troll.
Smith and his family are suffering
serious inconvenience from the cutting
off of their income. If unemployment
continues much longer, the lnconven-
fence will become real privation. But
the employer and the workman and
their families are not the only victims
of the faulty system. The traction
company ON whose cars Jim had trav-
eled to and from mis- daily work is
collecting fewer fares than before; the
clothing shops and food stores at
which Jims family traded are making
fewer sales; and even the movies are
collecting fewer dimes.
Meanwhile, lot of able-bodied men
in other trades are idle, too, or work
ing part time. Every one of them
needs lot of things he is capable of
making and lot of other things that
the rest are capable of making They
all know that any talk of "over pro-
duction" is absurd so long as there
! are unsatisfied human wants vastly in
excess of the existing goods capable
of supplying those wants. But for
some mysterious reason times are
bad" and the processes of production
and exchange have become disordered.
| If jim, who can weave clothing and
John, who can raise wheat, and Jacob,
+, who can build houses and a few others
| like them. were cast on an island with
ample natural resources they would
not sit around in idleness waiting for
price reimbursement" but would get
! busy and make things and exchange
them, so that each would have as many
comforts as all working to the best
of their ability could supply
Sometimes in their days of idleness,
| these men wonder whether an indus
trial revolution might not bring about
conditions approximating those on
communism that might work well in
! a primitive society of small numbers
would bring only disaster to a
twentieth century nation of hundred
million people These wiser heads
have studied the fundamentals of econ
omics and know that wages and CAPT
tai and interest and rent and profits
are founded in the eternal nature Of
things. But they don't believe that
the eternal nature Of things requires
such extremes of poverty and wealth
as are found at present, together with
long periods of unemployment and
! frequent business panics; and unless
society shall find some means of over
coming these glaring and needless
faults of the existing order, the wiser
heads may soon find 1t impossible to
keep the hotter heads from forcible
attempt to try some of the panaceas
that the agitators have painted IN
glowing colors.
So, to employ Jim Smith with
steady employment and to devise
means of his owning his home, be-
comes not only a humanitarian task,
whose solution will benefit all with
whom Jim's wages would normally be
spent, and provide an antidote against
the spread of revolutionary propa-
ganda.
And what it the answer 1t is
PARTLY. of course. in further refine
ments of our systems of banking,
credits. transportation, merchandise
ing, industrial relations, taxation. and
other factors affecting business sta
biiity. Jim Smith may hope that
these refinements will insure steady
Job for his young son some decades
hence; but Jim wants job now, and
the public welfare demands that he
have a Job now. 1t demands also
that our governments-mu
county, state and national-shall
speedily catch up with the construc-
ton Of public improvements which
would have been built ere this but for
the setback of the war. The public
welfare is in need, too, of millions OF
new homes to provide decent housing
for Americas wage-earners. Indus
trial housing corporations must sup
plement the work of the speculative
builders.
Here. then, is the opportunity for
the clear heads to stimulate business
by utilizing as many of the unem-
pioyed as may be possible in building
| houses and constructing public works.
MAYBE part of the cost of the houses
will have to be written off some day
by the industrial housing corporations
/ that build them: and maybe the roads,
bridges. water works and sewerage
systems and other public improve
n5ents could be built cheaper year or
two hence; but if meanwhile society
4 IS lssing the productive abilities OF
/ Jim and John and Jacob, and if they
have Joined the groups who are talk
/ ing "redD as we'll as seeing red" the
net loss to society viii be vastly
greater than any possible shrinkage
+ in values in houses or public improve
ents constructed at 1921 prices
i From The American City.