Newark post., 1922-03-01

duced business, buyers 1or retali
stores have not been in the markets,
and wholesale trade in general has
been dull. This in turn accounts for
the fact that manufacturers as a
whole have thus far received but
small proportion of the orders for
spring delivery, which under normal
conditions would long since have been
on their books. AS result, opera
tions in all industries are consider
ably below normal, and in several
instances are less than 80 per cent. of
capacity.
A reflection of the low rate of oper-
ations is found. in the employment
reports of the Pennsylvania State
Department of labor. That bureau
estimated the unemployed in the six
7 cities of Altoona, Harrisburg, Phila-
delphia, Scranton and Williamsport,
on February Is, at 234,275, larger
number for these cities than at any
time during 1921. And the bureaus
report indicates also that there has
been little change in industrial ac-
tivity since the first of the year. The
number of unemployed on January l
was 243 1885, on January Is, 234,9lO;
on February l, 232,96O; and on Feb
ruary Is, 234,275. Reports received
by this bank from other sections of
the district also indicate that unem-
ployment is very prevalent, many
manufacturers stating that the num-
Der of applications received has been
exceptionally large.
Statistics indicative of underlying
conditions are conflicting. The num-
Der of commercial failures in the
| United States has continued to rise
rapidly. R. G. Dun & Company re-
port 2,723 failures in January as
against 2,444 in December. The aver
age liabilities in January, however,
were S27 100, and in December $780,
S02. In the Third Federal Reserve
District there were Il more failures
in January than in December, but the
total liabilities were S1,614,818 less.
AS pointed out last month, this in
crease in the number of failures is
not necessarily an unfavorable sign,
for in the past, with the approach of
the end of a period of business de-
preston, the number of failures has
usually increased, with a decrease
The volume of new securities issued
has fallen off, the figure in January
being 5000, ,661 800, as compared with
$318,335, 100 in December. Debts to
individual accounts, too, have declined,
the average for the four-weeks'
period ending February Is being ST.
7O4269, 900, as against $8,385, ,623, 900,
the average for the like period end
ing January IS. And the untitled
orders of the United States Steel
Corporation on January 81 were A.
241,67S tons, a decrease of 26,736 tons
as compared with those of December
81. The figure on December 81, 1921,
was 7,573,164.
On the other hand, car loading fig
ures have shown a consistent gain
since the first of the year. Over 10,-
900 more cars were loaded in the week
ending February than in the previ-
Gus week, this being largely attri-
butable to the increased shipments of
oal in anticipation of strike on April
l. Then too, the Bradstreet and R. G.
Dun wholesale commodity price index
numbers have continued to rise, the
| increase of the former during Janu-
; ary being A per cent, and of the
! latter 3 per cent. However, the Bur-
eau of Labor index number, which is
based on the prices of 1923 commodi-
ties, fell during January from 149 to