Norwich bulletin., 1921-06-03
REDUCTIONS TO PRODUCER DON'T REACH THE ,.t CONSUMER

aroused. It was fine. day the roads were good, my tank was full of gasoline, the tires had been fully inflated before | set out. I determined to track the high i flying cheese of my dreams to it's lair if it had such a thing. So off I went | from one store to another. Through three | towns the chase led me, I tried stores in villages, and stores in small hamlets, and stores on little travelled backroads. At the ninth attempt I felt sure of hear ing at least different figure. There's luck in odd numbers" I quoted to my self. Moreover. this ninth dealer has long had the reputation of giving bar gains" I didn't believe he would parrot off that everlasting forty cents" to me
 He didn't
 When I sauntered into his emporium and casually inquired. Well whatre you getting for datase, today 2 he looked up with q smile that was as child like and bland as that of Bret Harte's Chinaman. Wall." said he. "cheese is a-goin down. jest now. I've got some that I've been gittin' forty-five cents for, but I'll make it forty-two today, seein' it's you"
 I staggered out into the sunlight in s- lence. What was the use talking? My limited vocs bulary wasn't equal to the occasion, at it's best, and I felt Tlat home was the most fitting place for me. When had arrived and hung ID my hat | and my Ford on their customary hooks, I sought a shady place behind the barn and tried to think it out But my think machine wasn't equal to the jo4s Which is why I'm passing it over to you, now.
 What's the matter with cheese?
 If the cheesemakers can get for it only twelve cents pound al the fac tories. and if the New York city whole l salers are offering it freely for from | thirteen to fifteen cents pound in the l city where does The difference go be- | tween the fifteen cent cost at New i York and the fortv-cent price here at i Podunk Flats, a hundred and fifty miles 1 away? Who cats it? The railroads say 1 they don't; the wholesalers say they 1 don't: the retailers say they don't. Does l it evaporate? Does it take to itself wings and r. away? Or is somebody 1 lying and profteerinG and-not to be too squeamisN in words-swindling?
 You tel, please.
 In the meantime, John Farmer is dO- ing without cheese and will continue to do so till he finds a reasonably fair re.a- ton established between the actual cost of cheese and it's selling price.
 | In this connection a statement made to me last week by our local butcher
 is suggestive He said that he is now able to get only S9 cents for a calf skin whicl, a year ago, brought him from four to five times as much. And that he is offered only three cents a pound for beef hides which. a year ago, re-
 turned him more than six times as much
 But when you and I want shoes or ! 2 m 11e
 that the high price of leather forbds | any appreciabie reduction in the price ot either. Yet leather is only tanned hide
 And if the price of hides has loo3ed the
 loop downward four or six times in
 the last year. what's the real reason thai
 leather can't do loop or two, likewise
 and in. sympathy?
 Now. here are two commodities of
 wide use-cheese and leather. The
 price of the farm produced raw materials
 for both has gone down, down. down
 like a lump of lead in No-Bottom pond
 But the price of the finished products
 remain almost a the peak, i e. to the
 ultimate consumer. The producer i.
 getting only half or a quarter what ht
 used to; the consumer is paying abou ; as much as ever.
 Somewhere between the two there big leak in the rR '-line connecting $ them. ID find that leak and plug it III
 is one of the things for which our gov
 ernment was instituted and for which i has been given great powers. It is al
 so one of the things which governmen does not do, never has done and prob
 ably never will do. IL certainly will no till an aroused public sentiment force it to. And a really aroused public senti
 ment, if such a thing ever does come t pass won't need government help t
 enforce it's findings. It will enforce then ! of itself and with primitive directness. The worst Of it is that such en- 1 forcement is liable to be attended b, e more or less regrettab,e accidents some [ times to innocent parties. If the electe representatives of the people would giv I about ten times as much attention a
 they do to things the people really ar S interested in, and about one-tenth a