The Wallace miner. [volume] (Wallace, Idaho) 1907-current, 1922-05-25

"AoA NObiu 5lNt YOU Il real Opll
mistic story regarding business condi
tons, said Judge Robert S Lovett
chairman of the board of directors O.
the Union Pacific system, with head.
quarters in New York City on his ar
rival in Salt Lake yesterday morning
Business generally throughout the
country is, I believe improving. but as
reflected by railroad traffic, the rate
OF improvement is very slow. 1 believe
however, that it will be practically
continuous, though certainly without
any boom, at least until crops are
made and moved.
The greatest damper on business
revival and the greatest menace to the
return of prosperity in this country is
taxation. I am sure people generally
do not realize the seriousness of this
aspect of the situation. Business is
carried on for profit; men undertake
new enterprises employ labor and take
the risks for profit; it is largely the
surplus wealth of the rich, invested in
enterprises carried on by others, that
affords most employment for labor
outside of agriculture
Income surtaXes which take half of
the profits a man makes, while leaving
him to suffer the loss alone, has taken
the heart out of many of the men who
have hitherto created the country's
business. A man generally risks his
whole fortune when he engages in
business and therefore he has had a
notion that he is entitled to most of
the profit. Younger men who have
hoped by great energy, new enterprise
and initiative to accumulate a fortune
see that possibility dwindlng as ex-
cessive surfaces become a fixed policy
of the government.
Then, too, the processes of common
sense seem to be reversed in our basis
of taxation. Instead of a premium on
enterprise and industry by a lower tax
on earned than invested income, just
the opposite is the law. A salary or
profit made by personal effort is taxed
the maximum rate under the provis-
ions for surtaxes, while capital escapes !
the tax altogether by being invested in !
securities. The result is not |
only a sense of injustice suffered and |
in the individual rely !
Ing upon his own efforts, but an orgy
Of recklessness and extravaganza in
expenditures unparalleled in
to supply bonds for tax-ex-
empt investment of capital These
huge sums are not only going into tax
exempt securities, shifting the burden
If taxation to industry but are being
withdrawn from investment in indus
rial enterprises of all sorts that en-
1loy labor, and in the building of
ZONES for housing the people.
But that is not all-nOt by half
x-exempt bond issues by village.
own, city, county and state with 9TH
r extravagances which attend waste
nj habits, are increasing state and
municipal taxation to an extent that is
ruly alarming I read a press dis ,
atch recently wherein one states /
axes had become so high that farmers, l
n many localities, could not afford to
wn their land and were literally for
citing it,
Railroads are feeling it even more i'd
cavity; and, of course. this means d
hat it must ultimately be borne by the
business The total taxes O
aid by the Union Pacific system ten b
ears ago-that is, for the year 1s11- %
mounted to S41SOO9S, while the taxes r,
aid for 1921 were S12536,O7S OF this a,
tier amount S3,SS0576 was paid to Il
lie federal government, whereas only n
,74,15S federal taxes were paid ten a,
ears ago; and, of course. there is Il
'om for saying that this should be ex-
uded from the comparison because il
as. in effect war tax But exclud-
g this federal taxation, the state and
her municipal taxes alone, in no wise
argable to the war, increased in ten d
airs from $685. S9 in 1911 to sS,7O5,- 70
Z in 1921 or 1913 per cent A.
I'm building OF planning to build de
ilroad the inquiry of prime import NJ
ce has always been. how much will Tin