Arizona republican., 1922-04-29
aPittsburs Plus

we learn from a dlSpatch IN The Republican
terday that attack is being made the Pitsburg
Plus" "Pittsburg plus describes an arrangement
in the producing industry under which the price
of from any point takes the Pittsburg price
basis and is to that the freight from
Pittsburg to the point from which the steel is pur-
chased. Thus If Chicago manufacturer or one in
Birmingham or Pueblo wants to buy steel from one
Of the nearby mills and sends truck to the mill
door for IT, he pays the Pitsburg price for the
that Is added the freight from Pittsburg to
Chicago. Birmingham Pueblo. as the case may be.
Phoenix hardware merchant dealer in
building materials should buy steel at Pueblo Colo
rado. the freight he would have to pay on would
not be merely the freight from Pueblo to Phoenix
but addition, the freight from Pittsburg to Pueblo
This freight though would be added to the price of
the steel. 1t is estimated that the of money
paid out annually by the of steel products for
imaginary freight alone amounts to not much less
than 500 100000 all of which goes into the pockets
the "steel trust which has devised and which en-
forces this indefensib1e arrangement.
The only excuse offered it is that it is neces-
sary to stabilize the steel market that Pittsburg
adjusting the balance Of supply between the now
widely separated steel-producing points, should fix
the price and dominate the field.
This arrangement under another name, that is
ago. after Mr.. Carnegie had well established the
steel industry at Pittsburg. 1t was carried out then
through his control influence over railroads
There were then no steel manufacturing plants west
of Pittsburg, the arrangement not made
give Pittsburg domination the western field but
the east so that its products could laid
Atlantic coast points at the price The
acturers of steel at those points could produce
IL. It was a arrangement: there was no
steel trust then. It carried out through the
batting system There followed almost unbe-
levabe indescribable chaos Of rates by which,
said. at one time it possible to send steel from
Pittsburg to Chicago then send it back through
Pittsburg to New York where it laid down at
the price of steel produced on the Atlantic coast.
Under the interstate commerce commission act
seven eight years later this arrangement became
a crime and the method subsequently changed,
though rebatng continued less outbreakingly for
many years later the organized steel trust and
the Standard Oil company being the chief offenders.
At length even secret rebating became impossible.
and the "Pittsburg Plus" into being, producing
precisely the results both to the pockets of
the steel trust and the pIundering of consumers
In the meantime the steel-producing industry
expanded with the discovery Of vast iron and
coal bodies in the northwest and the south. Steel
cago. at Birmingham. Alabama; Bessemer, Colorado
and at Duluth. On account of the proximity of the
Calumet, Birmingham and Duluth to materials
steel can be produced there cheapy than at
Pittsburg.
A statement not long ago by an officer OF the
trust admitted that the cost of production in the
Calumet district almost 20 per cent less than
the cost at Pittsburg. So the western and
for that matter, the eastern consumer at point
between Chicago Pitsburg, where the difference
between the cost Of production at these points
is not absorbed by the freight from Chicago, is COM
PEELED to pay the higher price, and the western
sumner is mucted for not only the imaginary freight
charges from Pittsburg but for the Pittsburg
price over just price for the Chicago product.
The "Pittsburg Plus" plan some time ago was
attacked before the federal trade commission by
several associations in which dealers in steel prod
ucts consumers and the American Farm Bureau
represented series OF hearings taken place.
1t would seem that this is a matter which should
not REQUIRE an extended hearing The undisputed
fact of the existence of the "Pittsburg Plus" plan
ought to be sufficient to the government to
take steps for abolition and If it should develop
that the lacks power to ask Congress
for power equal to that which was given it in the
interstate act to prohibit the accomplish
ment of similar end by the rebating system.
Any action by the government would. of course,
produce another outcry against government in bus-
ness" just as the enactment of the interstate com
merce act was believed to be unwarranted inter-
ference with private business.
1,n pn,trY YIEEr