The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-06-17

way Is S,557 miles. A saving of be- tween 5000 and 1000 miles would thus be effected"
 tho head of a department which em- ploys six thousand men, told me he
 is getting only about ten dollars a month. and that notwithstanding the fact that before the war he made
 four thousand dollars a year. In one
 factory l saw three men straining as
 they carried machine weighing several hundred pounds from one
 side of the room to the other. I asked their wages. The reply was in
 marks and it equalled less than two cents per hour. The elevator man inside the tower said his wage was fifty cents per week and that it took ne-fourth of all he made to pay for the milk for his five months old
 baby. The head of the department
 of whom l have spoken, only oc-
 casionally has meat on his table, and
 he is still wearing the clothing he
 bought during the war.
 Germnny's Electrical Industry.
 These are the wages in an industry
 which prior to 1914 met it's com
 petitors in all parts of the world. The Germans have always stood hign
 in electrical matters. In 1913 their exports of electro technical products were valued at S69,000,000. Germany was then exporting more than S11,-
 000,O00 worth of incandescent lamps and about half that value in the form
 of appliances for illumination and
 the transmission of power. It was
 producing almost 100.000.Ooo light
 bulbs per annum, and of these it ex
 ported 58,000,000. There is another electric company here which is about
 equal to Siemensstadt. It is known
 as the Allgemeine Elektrizitats- ~ raCa huf md haf hn ~
 had gold capital of almost s40.000,- 900 and was making profit of s4,- 500,00 per annum. During the war
 it was turned to electro military
 purposes and its profits jumped up to s6,0O0, 900 and then s7,0O0.O0O and
 company was increased, but the
 shares were then quoted at 232. The company here is the Siemens- Halske and Shuckert, and It has
 probably done equally well. It is one of the oldest of the electrical more than three-quarters of cen tury ago, when Werner Siemens be-
 gan to build telegraph apparatus. Siemens was one of the great inVen- tors. having discovered the dynamo electric principle, and his inventions have kept this company far in the lead. About twenty years ago the Siemens company was combined with Shuckert and company and since then 1t has been in the front ranks of the electrical industry, and when the mark becomes stabilized 1t will
 have a bigger export than ever.
 A Talk With the Director
 During my stay at Siemensstadt I had talk with Dr. Ing. Carl Kott- gen, the chairman of the board Cf directors, as to the business situation l You many can have no real progress un-
 til conditions are settled and the na- tion has stabilized mark. Today the bulk of the electrical trade is domestic, consisting of replacements and repairs required on account of
 the war We get only about three values are such that business cannot bJ dc ne.
 Said nr. Kottgen: "The money of tomorrow may be worth only half as much as the money of today. and
 so when WIG think we sell at profit we find we have sold at a loss. It
 takes tour times the work and
 brains to run our business now that it did tC run the same business before the war. Wet get only about three fourths as much out of our labor, and
 the socialistic organizations are cut
 ting cown not only the time but the efficiency of the men as well. As 1t
 now, we work only eight hours and
 our wages are high in comparison n
 with the work we receive. When tie exchange becomes stable they
 vii. go to the highest"
 "It Is said that your captains of in dustry, including Hugo Shines, are in favor of keeping the mark low. Some think the whole scheme is to
 get out of paying your debts. They say you have impoverished the in
 vesting classes and that tnce mat ters ara settled you will start out
 with good plants free of debt, and
 economically conquer the world. That is blooming nonsense an | swered the chairman of the board .I know Shines. We have com bine with him. We all want stable conditions and we must have them to do business either here CT abroad. As it is now l cannot tell whether l am going to make a profit or loss When the mark is stable these low wages will disappear automatically, and our competition will be on an equal basis throughout the world. After that our industries will come | back to. nc rmal. What we need is government. that will tell Germany it must work more and work harder Poincare has promised that Germany will pay, but there is not enough production going on here to pay France. Do you think the Germans are going to work 15 or 20 years and give Ine-tenth of their earnings to France? Not much!"
 They Blame poincsre.
 ''The evil genius of the present sit
 uation," continued Dr. Kottgen, lis
 that man Poincare. He had great deal to do with causing the war,
 and history will show that his am | bitions are even more audacious than
 were those of Napoleon Bonaparte. The evidence of this is found in some documents unearthed by the bolshevists regarding his actions in | 1914 relating to the mobilization Of the army in Russia. What he wants | is to separate northern Germany from southern Germany and to hold on
 to the Rhine and the Ruhr either as an annex to France or as so closely