The Lee County journal. (Leesburg, Ga.) 1904-19??, 1923-08-10
.EDiSON-FORD PLANS J
ATTACK ON INTEREST 4
Abolition Of Rent No More Plausl'
BILE Than Abolition OF Pay
on Loans, Expert Shows.

II is no more unreasonable to pay in.
terest on a loan OF money than to
pay rent on a house, declares William
T. Foster, Director Of the Pollack
Foundation for Economic Research, In
exposing the fallacy OF the attack on
interest charges by Henry Ford and
Thomas A. Edison in their commodity
money scheme to do away with the
present financial system. Mr.. Fosters
argument is reviewed in the present
article which is one Of series pre-
pared by the American Bankers Assa'
citation.
"The Ford-Edison commodity money
plan is regarded as step toward the
abolition of all interest charges, Mr..
Foster says. Interest says the
Dearborn Independent, is a tax that
few ancient tyrants would have dared
impose. Interest in actual modern
practice is a contrivance whereby all
production is taxed by parasites, and
whereby money is given a supremacy
over men, material and management
which 1t cannot sustain.
Renting Money
But is there really anything more
terrible about paying for the use OK
money than about paying for the use
of anything else? Suppose a farmer
finds himself in need of harvesting
machine, and without enough money
to buy one. In that case he can either
borrow a machine of Neighbor Brown
or borrow money and buy machine.
The farmer would consider 1t right
to pay in some way for the use OF the
machine. Why should he expect to
borrow mOney-which is hOnored in
the markets in payment for the same
machine-without paying for the use
of the money?
"Now let us suppose tina! I5e farm.
err uses the machine SO successfully
that he saves thousand dollars.
With that money he can buy a farm
and he can let Neighbor Brown have
the use of it. Neighbor Brown natu'
rally would expect to pay rent. In
stead OF buying the farm, however, he
could lend the thousand dollars to his
neighbor In order that his neighblT
might buy the farm. In that case
Neighbor Brown should expect to pay
for the rent of the money. All this
seems clear. When the transactions
are as simple as these 1t Is plain that
there is just as great propriety in
charging for the use Of money as IN
charging for the use OF things that
money will buy.
Loaned Money Builds n School
I'VE may assume, however, thatI4Q
farmer does not want to buy land and
Neighbor Brown does not want to
borrow money. In that case the
farmer deposits his thousand dollars
in a bank and the bank pays him In.
terest for the use of his money. But
the bank can pay interest only II it
makes profitable use OF his money.
Now the bank finds that the city
needs high-school building, and has
decided to borrow enough money to
construct 1t. In order to obtain the
money the city has issued bonds, each
of which is promise to pay one thou.
sand dollars at specified date, and
interest in the meantime at specified
rate. The bank buys one of these
bonds. Thus the farmer has had
part in providing the city with a
school building; and the farmer he's
Just as much right to expect interest
for the use of his money as though he
had loaned the money directly or In.
directly to Neighbor Brown"