Evening star., 1925-11-09

6nh the results OF the fdL publicity idto.
TIE second article naI be published
fonorrolc.
Tax publicity, as practiced by the
Federal Government, has stripped the
last garment from the form of Ameri.
can business. 1t stands today stark
naked, revealing unadorned it's full.
ness OF income, its curves of expense
and its dimples OF profit. The tax
collector has done his work thor.
oughly; there is today no secret left
Take the motor car, for instance.
On every new car turned out by our
factories during their banner year,
1923, the average profit was S99. The
tax collect II compiled the informa-
ton; the United States Government
stands back of the figures.
Or, take the case Of coal. The
Federal Government informs the
world that the profits of the coal
industry during that prosperous year
were somewhat more than SIT 900, 900
an average profit Of about ~ cents
a ton.
National banks, by the same token,
are disclosed in the light of having
made profits averaging $4,000 for
each bank during the year-a shriv-
eled figure when compared with some
of our ideas as to bankers profits.
But it is the average, compiled by the
Government from the books of all the
national banks.
Thanks to the income tax law and
its modicum of publicity, anybody s
business has become everybody's s
business. This is a development of
the past 10 years or less. Yesterday y
business secrets as to costs and
profits were jealousy guarded. To
day anybody who wants to delve into
such secrets may do so to his hearts
content without stirring from his
easy chair. All he has to do is to
get the information from the Bureau
of Internal Revenue. 1t has been
compiled and printed and will be fur
nlshed on request.
Such procedure is not undertaken
under authority of the revenue law
Of 1924, which provided for a meas
ure of publicity for personal tax re-
turns. The authority goes hack fur
ther to the basic tax law, enacted
more than 10 years ago. That en-
actment gave the bureau authority
to compile facts and figures and make
them public in general totals with
out disclosing individual returns In
fact, 1t IS a penitentiary offense to
disclose individual returns, and they
are not disclosed. but the totals for
each line of business are. Tax pay
ments, however, are disclosed
Most of the business of the United
States is done by corporations and
most Of the taxes paid to the Federal
Government is paid by them. Their
Federal tax payments on 1923 bust
ness totaled more than S937 900 600
In making these payments, as every
one knows, the corporations We're re-
quired to submit to the Government
detailed returns, telling the intimate
story of their success or failure dur
ing the year.
These returns have been given to
the Governments statisticians and
totals have been run up for all the
corporations in the country, nearly
100000. They have been divided into
two classeS-those that have made
money and those that didn't. Incl
dentally the totals show that AZ per
cent Of all the corporations in the
country failed to make any profit at
all during our most prosperous year,
the present one alone excepted, since
the war. Fifty-eight per cent made
money: the others lost it.
Running a corporation, therefore, is
a hazardous business. Even in the
banner year of 1923 it was more haz-
ardous than six years before, or in
1917. In that year sc corporations out
of every 100 made money. The pros