The New York herald., 1922-07-17
Sand in the National Gears.
Mine the coal

Sand in the National Gears.
Has or has not the country's bust
ness been on the mend this year? Be-
Iycnd question it has. Not to the extent
the exuberant optimist would have us
all imagine along with him. Not as
it could have made headway If there
had been a more complete deflation
from artificial war expansion. And
not as would have been possible with
out so many and so serious strikes to
handicap the country's productive
powers.
Nevertheless the mile posts of i'm
proved conditions thus far in 1922
are clearly marked. 1t will not be
amiss to point them out.
In periods of rapidly rising or
steadily falling prices bank clearings
are not an accurate measure of the
actual. physical business, the pro-
duction and distribution of concrete
things, that make the national
wealth-the real wealth--which mere
dollar marks. paint them on as you
will. cannot make. Wage payment
records are not. Transportation ton
mage figures are.
Here, again, the man who sets out
to make comparisons must know what
he is comparing. 1t has been fairly
ridiculous the way the superheated
optimists have tried to picture great
business boom through the color of
car loading comparisons, not OF one
annual or seasonal period with corre-
spending periods of other years or
seasons, but of June, say, with April,
or April with February, &c. But,
even when industrial misfortune and
business calamity ride at the gallop,
the. summer car loadings always will
surpass the midwinter car loadings.
Again, car loadings of certain terri
tory that is not typical or of certain
products that may be exceptional are
not safe guide as to national condi-
tions. One great railroad system, for
example, showed in the first half OF
this year an increase in car loadings
Of about 20 per cent. over the corre-
spending 1921 half year. In June
this road showed a car loading gain
of as much as 35 per cent. over the
preceding June.
But a year ago the section which
that railroad serves was fiat on its
back to a degree not equaled, per-
haps, anywhere else in the country.
It's gain of this year, compared with
the productive destitution of the first
half of last year, is sensational. But
compared with other years, compared
with the normal, the 1921 car load
ing gains of that particular road and
that particular section are still thin
and scrawny.
But, when all is said and done. it
is fact that in the first quarter Of
this year the car loadings OF all the
railroads in the whole country, taken
together, showed a gain. 1t was
nothing marvellous, it was nothing
to excite anybody into a boom
stampede. But it was gain--a
gain for the general distribution Of
all the country's products, measured
| in tons, barrels, bushels and pounds.
And there is no better economic
gauge than that.
/ In the three months the railroad
loadings of manufactured products
gained ITO per cent; agricultural
products, 1.41 per cent; animal prod
ucts, 2.27 per cent; mine products,
6.6S per cent.
! There were losses, notably in load
ings Of forest products, which went
down 5.23 per cent. But, all taken
/ together, the freight tonnage, the ac-
tual quantity Of natural wealth, real
wealth, produced, distributed and
used for the first quarter of 1922. was
416,29S,Ss9, as against the first quar-
ter 1921 tonnage of 02,114,193.
A total net gain for the whole
country of 3.53 per cent. Not tidal
wave; tide turn. Not sweep; a
start-under all the circumstances a
very good start. But strikes in a
basic industry like coal and in an
essential economic agency like trans
portation can, il the nation so per-
mits. set back the swing that was
moving to better times.
! After all the waiting for the bleak
days OF 1920 and 1921 to be over. is
this now to be the way-throwing
sand in the gears of work and busi-
ness. blocking the road to pros
perity?
1t is something to command the
earnest, the grave consideration of
I the American people.
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A ooJo, fos t6o II~ovn~IzI