New-York tribune., 1921-09-16
Steady Gain in Employment,
Chief Plants Have Orders
Ahead, and Cheerfulness
Dispels Business Gloom
Seasonal Slump Averted
Country Must Have Cars to
Meet Transport Demand,
Dealers Convention Hears
From, d Staff Correspondent

| SAilLllS oI iSIl WAS paIdlyZeu inUuS-
trially, has regained full use of its
economic limbs. The recovery has been
sustained for eight months, and the
principal trade diagnosticians here are
e. ~tremely hopeful regarding the fu
ture. The panicky fears of last De-
cember have given way to tempered
! optimism.
The story of the city's rebound from
a sudden collapse after a period of
balloonlke expansion is told in the
records of employment At the greatest
depth of depression, on January 1 of
this year, there we're only 37,500 per-
sons gainfully employed here, accord
ing to the seemingly trustworthy cst-
Detroit. Figures for the current week,
compiled to-day, indicate that more
than $4,000 are on the pay rolls. At
the peak of the war boom, on March
%, 1920, there were 3OS,0OO men and
women employed within the confines of
this municipality.
Growth Startled Residents
In the last decade Detroit grew with
such amazing rapidity that no one now
is able to define normalcy locally. Ex
actly year ago business here, though
having receded somewhat from the
high level of the preceding March, was
still unusually large. At present there
are 64 per cent as many ganfully en-
ployed in the city as a year ago.
Production, measured in terms of
units Of goods t1rned ont ic rraot
relatively than a comparison of en-
ployment statistics indicates, for the
testimony of automotive executives is
that the efficiency of the human ele-
ment in manufacturing has increased
tremendously since the depression
started. Many delegates to the fifth
annual convention of the Motor and Ac-
cessory Manufacturers Association, the
second days session of which was held
to-day at the Hotel Statler, testified to
the marked improvement in the pro-
dustry, and similar statements were
made by automobile officials, bankers
and research men here with whom the
Tribune correspondent discussed the
matter.
Detroit in ordinary years, like other
big American cities, habitually has
some unemployment Though much
smaller than at the beginning Of the
year, unemployment remains abnor-
mally large, and trade estimates place
it at $4,000 persons. The ranks would
be still larger if the municipality were
not pushing public works, particularly
sewer building. Many of the outsiders
who we're employed in this "industrial
Klondike" during the period of infla-
tion have returned to the myriad places
in agriculture and industrial centers
from whence they were attracted by
the lure of high wages. A canvass b.
local statisticians indicates that II, 900
members Of this "suitcase population"
departed when hard times came. With
rents and the cost of living high here
they preferred to go elsewhere during
the months of industrial recession.
Ford Leads in Labor Productivity
Henry Ford, who remains aloof, un-
attached to business associations and
isolated from most of the other bust
ness leaders here, retains his place
perpetualiy in the limelight. Local
business men and bankers say that his
plants have gone further than others
in heightening labor productivity and
that, with more than 20 per cent re-
ducton in personnel, their output is
the greatest in the history of the com
panv. The latest price cuts have slim
u'ated buying and the Ford plants are
understood to have enough untitled or
dcrs on their books to keep running for
two months. Dodge Brothers, who
cvercame depression by changing sell
ing agents who were not disposing Of
cars, have untitled orders amounting to
g months production The Cadillac
and Studebske" plants are busy once
more and Continental Motors, which,
supplying the motive power to many
cars, is a barometer of the industry,
reports heightened activity.
Ordinarily the fall brings a seasonal
slump in the automotve industry, but
men in the trade who learned during
the setback how to fight for orders
will try to forestall halt by stressing
the value of the closed car as an all
year round utility. A national dealers
association is planning to implant this
idea in consuming America by means
of an "enclosed car week"
The industrial tone in Detroit during
the coming winter hinges on the auto
motive industry. which amounts to
three-fourtns Of the city's industrial
life. Of the industries of this city,
the miscellaneous group, which in
cludes stove making, drugs, industrial
chemicals, brass and tools, is at present
less prosperous than the makers OF
passenger automobiles.
The basis for optimism here is the
fact that the corrective phases Of read
jrstment and defation have, in the
Iopinion of commercial and financial
leaders, taken place. Automobile prices
have been to large extent liquidated,
and, although a price war is still being
waCed, industrial Detroit thinks thar,
compared with other products, automo-
biles are cheap The local banks have
in recent months strengthened their
position markedly, and are at present
borrowing little at the Federal Reserve
Bank. AS elsewhere, their main problem
is an orderly liquidation of frozen
loans BY next spring, after the stim-
ulus to the automotive trade that is
expected from the national shows in
January, and when the crops are
planted, even the most conservative
bankers here predict a conspicuous
| upturn.
: Steady Gain Encourages Bankers
Detroit fnanciers find hope in the
fact that the Improvement has been
steady and unspectacular. They re-
gard the willingness of labor to re-
adjust itself to changing conditions
as favorable factor, and, though dis
>, liking and hoping against vcpitition
Of uneven booms followed by drastic
depressions, they are looking forward
to slow return to permanent pros
perity.
In giving an outsiders reasons fo,
faith in the future of the automotive
industry, Theodore Price, editor OF