davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
comes, called hard times.

| cOme5, called hard times.
The phenomenon of hard times
can easily be traced to the artificial
boosting of the selling price of land.
Without land there is no production,
without land labor and capital can
not produce wealth, and when the
selling price of land is run beyond
the power of labor and capital to
pay the tribute, then labor and capi-
tai must cease production, and be-
hold hard times.
There is no real scarcity of land,
of labor or of capital. The high SELL
ing price of land has the same ef-
feet upon the quantity of land as
if large part of this continent were
to sink below the sea. Our tax sys-
TEN pays men to hold land out of
use for speculative purposes, and in
addition the same foolish system of
taxation fines and penalties every
body who uses land, and in using
land employs labor and capital.
Notwithstanding all of our univer-
stiles, colleges and schools, notwith-
standing the modern development of
thought in the minds of business
men, there is a singular ignorance
as to what the selling price of land
really is, and we owe all of our
troubles to this lack of scientific
understanding.
The selling price of land is not
the value of any wealth produced.
An increase in the selling price of
land does not mean an increase in
the production of wealth. An in
crease in the selling price Of land
does not mean that the people as
whole are any wealthier, it does not
mean that there has been anything
added to the general stock of wealth.
1t simply means that the earth own
ers are able to collect from the earth
users more of their product in pay
meht for the privileges of using that
which God or nature made and the
people collectively made valuable.
When men as land owners grow
wealthy, men who are workers grow
relatively poorer.
Another evil that grows out of this
is the fact that when society fails
to collect any part of its economic
rent for itself, it is forced to take
private property for the support of
government in lieu of the values that
the people had created and that the
government had failed to collect for
social purposes.
There is a lot of silly talk today
about over-productiOn. When l can
step out on the streets of New York
and l can see thousands of people
who could wear better and more
clothing, 1 see thousands of people,
yes tens of thousands, who could
live in better homes, l see tens of
thousands of people who could eat
more food and better food, in fact,
whichever way you turn you see
want, you see that grim, dreadful
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
EFFECT OF COMMUNITY
PROGRESS

If you attempt to start progressive
movements in a community, many
people at once ask, What am I 60
ing to get out of it?" They may not
say that in so many words, but it is
in the back of their minds, and it
governs their conduct. They won't
cooperate with public movements,
unless. they can see clearly that
those movements will bring them
some personal and tangible benefits.
Such folks should realize that
when a community increases in
wealth and gains new improvements,
everyone gets a benefit. There is
more money in circulation. Employ
ers can pay better wages, they have
more opportunities open for ambiti-
GUS people, more jobs that seek
workers.
People who own homes or a little
business, find the same becoming
more valuable. The home owner
finds his real estate worth more, the
business man finds a greater demand
for his goods.
The improved prosperity enables
public institutions to be better sup
ported. More money can be put into
schools, and better schoolhouses can
be provided, and higher salaries Of
fered to keep capable teachers who
otherwise would go elsewhere. The
churches are more prosperous and
can pay more fore their services.
Clubs and societies can have better
facilities.
Parks and Fairgrounds. can be
provided. for the better health and
safety and development of young and
old, particularly the children. Lii
braries and reading rooms can be
provided, or improved if they already
exist. Life can be raised to higher
level all along the line. All these re-
suits are open to us here in Milford
If we will take hold of practical pro-
gressive movements, and organize
for continued business and civic
s
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
=oeG
VACATION BAGGAGE

People setting out for summer va
cations used to be appealed to to
travel with smaller trunks. 1t was
complained that trainmen, pOrters,
expressmen, ETC., often suffered in
juries because of having to handle
too heavy baggage.
In these times many people have
learned to travel with a small
amount of baggage. If they are
touring by automobile, the women
folks do not probably want COM
plete assortment of party dresses.
1t makes travelling easier, if people
can learn to travel light. Many folks
go all over this country or Europe
with a suitcase. And at that they had
many more comforts than their an
cestors had when they settled this
country. Our wants can be reduced
to a very few things if we are not
too vain.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
AVOID HAND INFECTIONS

Beware of all substances that ir-
ritate or scrape the skin warns DR..
Charles F. Pabst, chief dermatolO-
gist of Greenpoint hospital, if you
would avoid "mycotic infection" or
eczema of the hands. Also during the
outdoor sports season, he points out,
the skin of the hands is frequently
injured, yet the damage is overlook
ed because the injury is usually
small and painless. Whenever the
skin is irritated or broken a real
peril exists because the way is open
for the entrance of many varieties
of infection. DR.. Pabst further de-
clares that rs per cent of the So
called eczema of the hands is not
eczema at all, but is in reality an
Inflammation of the skin caused by
infection with a fungus. For this
reason, he says, public health au-
thorities are giving close attention
to skin diseases of the hands, term
ed "occupational dematitis, be-
cause they have been responsible for
considerable disability among indus,
trial wOrkers.-The Pathfinder.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
TAXATION
WHY UNEMPLOYMENT

!
Up the land and down the land and
all over the land the cry OF hard
times is rising. This is not new
cry, we have heard it many times.
1t comes regularly after every pc
riod of good times. Something hap
pens, something throws the machin-
cry of production and distribution
out of joint, shadow falls over the
people.
The sum total of human misery is
involved in the cry of hard times.
Stephen Foster expressed the hope
of the human heart in one of his inn
mortal songs, Hard Times Come
Again No More" There is nothing
people dread so much as hard times,
nothing that leaves such painful
memories.
Unemployment means a dreadful
increase in fear of what disaster may
be ours tomorrow. Unemployment
means lack of food, lack of raiment,
lack of shelter, inability to meet the
grocer's bill, the butchers bill, in
ability to meet the rent. 1t is indeed
narrowing, painful experience, no
WGuQ6T p6OplG uI6du II.
Hard times has come so often and
so regularly that one could almost
believe there was something natural
about it, that it had to be, that some
how or other it was a plan of nature
that could not be avoided, that it
was to be suffered, endured. Well,
if it is natural, then it cannot be
avoided, but is it natural? Are not
hard times the result really of vio-
lation of the natural order, some
stupid interference by mankind with
the free play of natural law that pro-
duces this calamity?
l can. see no reason whatever IN
any law of nature or order of nature
for the recurrence of hard times,
but / do see very clearly that these
periodical experiences are due to
gross violation of natural law.
Now, the factors of production are
land, labor and capital. The result
of these forces cooperating, produces
wealth, and wealth is distributed into
the three channels of rent, payment
for the use of land only, wages, the
return to labor, and interest, the re-
turn to capital. AS long as these
three factors retain a correct rela-
tionship to each other, there is no
reason to expect hard times, and
there is no reason for hard times.
However, during a period of good
times, we find period of land boom
ing, an artificial boosting up of the
selling price of land always follows
as a sort of an unavoidable sequence,
and with the running up of land val
ues, in a little while production falls
off. labor and capital are thrown out
of employment and this dread thing
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
go
CARE OF THE HOME PLACE

There are many folks, some of
them in Milford, who can be depend
ed upon to give their home places a
general cleanup and going over
about once or twice year, but who
afterward neglect the appearance
of their home grounds, and they soon
become ragged and unattractive.
People should take pride enough in
their homes so that they look out
constantly for the defects that keep
appearing.
Careful people keep their shrubs
nicely trimmed, they line up their
walks and get rid of ragged edges,
they plant grass seed in the bare
spots, they never allow any refuse
to collect. 1t is a pleasure to live
in home like that, and gives one
the same feeling of satisfaction that
a woman gets from beautiful new
dress, or that a man gathers from a
choice new suit of clothes.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
WOMEN IN INDUSTRY

One of the most interesting of the
facts to be revealed by the 1880 cen
sus, will be as to the progress of wo-
men in the industries. In the decade
from 1910 to 1920, there was an enor-
nous increase of the number of wo-
men in wage-earning occupations.
The number of women clerks in
creased in those 10 years from 49,
900 to 100000. Stenographers and
typists increased from 1000 to
$4,000 Increases as large or near
ly so were found in many Occupa
tions.
Has similar increase kept on
through the decade from 1920 to 1880,
or were the figures for 1920 aTtifi-
cially stimulated by war conditions?
1t would seem probable that the
1880 figures will show still more wo-
men at work in business and indus
trial occupations than in 1920. They
have constantly been spreading into
most occupations, except those re-
quiring strong muscular capacity.
They have proved their fitness to do
all kinds of work, though employers
often hesitate to give them the high
er positions because of the feeling
that the majority of them have their
hearts set on marriage. a..
The complaint is often made that
these women workers have displaced
an equal number of men, so that the
country's production is not enlarged.
But the country will never gain any
thing by trying to prevent anyone
from working who wants to do so.
The money these women have earned
increased the spending power of the
American people. 1t employed many
more workers than could be employ
ed before, so there are not probably
any more unemployed men than
when these women went to work. ~
They have manifested a fidelity
and earnestness fully equal to men.
The only limitation on their success
appears to be their tendency to get |
married, for which no one will blame
them. ......z
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01

elders, because the latter speak only
poor English. That is one reason
why many children go wrong. Their
parents may not know much Eng
lish, but they have had lot of ex-
perience, and in most cases the chill
dren will get into difficulty if they
disregard their advice about conduct.
The youngsters should remember
that book education is not the only
kind there is. Life also educates.
Observant people are learning every
day, and even if they know little
from books, they know more about
human nature and the ways Of the
world than the children who are
still novices and amateurs in the
game of life. Children who try to
educate their parents may be in the
position of the pupil who attempts
to boss the teacher.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
ROTrALIZNG WEALTH

According to many philosophers
the world suffers from the great in
equalities of wealth. 1t is felt to be
wrong that while many people have
vast wealth, far more than they
know what to do with, yet there are
llasses of people who suffer from
poverty.
One way to prevent inequalities of
wealth, is to make everyone poor, as
Russia has done successfully. If the
principle is admitted, that each per-
son have what he produces, then
there is bound to be great ineqqual-
ity, since some people, by their pow
en- to organize great business enter
prises efficiently, can produce thou
sands as much as those who can
only do one little thing, and many of
whom can not do that one thing
well.
There are three possible ways to
equalize wealth in part. First, by
heavy taxation. The effect of that is
not always what was expected. If
business is taxed, it often adds the
taxes to the prices the people pay.
Also many people avoid taxation le-
gally by investing their money in
bonds that are exempt by law from
taxation. And curiously enough,
many people who claim wealth
should be equalized, yet resist prop
ositions to tax all bonds. They like
to encourage states and municipali-
ties to borrow money and go in for
business enterprises, which is made
easier through selling tax exempt
bonds.
Another way to equalize wealth
is for the state to take over and op-
crate industrial enterprises, so that
people can not make money out of
them. But the result of that is US
ually to make such industries sub
ject to political influences which
work against efficiency and produc-
ton, and which therefore tend to
make wages in those industries low.
Probably the best way to equalize
wealth, is to encourage wealthy peo-
pie to be generous with their money, !
in providing institutions by which
people are helped over misfortune
and enabled to abolish their own pow
erty.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
QUANTITY PRODUCTION

One of the large factors in Ameri-
can prosperity, is quantity produc-
tion. 1t has turned out vast quanti-
ties of goods at a low price, and is
one of the principal reasons why
America is more prosperous than
Europe. .r
We should never have had guam
tity production, if it had not been
for advertising. Without modern
advertising, people would have scat
tered their purchases around among
thousands of small dealers. AS a
result, prices of many staples would
be far higher than they now are. And
as advertising reduces production
cost, it can likewise be used to re-
duce distribution costs in retail
stores. 1t increases the volume of
their trade, enabling it to be done
at less expense per article.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
EDUCATING THE PARENTS

81 am getting education partly so
1 can help my parents to learn
things" said a high school girl re-
Gently. She was perfectly serious,
and this remark indicated common
point of view among the younger
generation.
While the old folks are worrying
about the alleged wildness of the
young crowd, the young crowd are
worrying about the antiquated ideas
held by their elders.
Modern children have better op-
portunities than their parents had,
and the parents should not be so
sure of elderly wisdom that they re-
fuse to learn through them. The
statements of textbooks and teach
ers which they bring home are al
most always true, though sometimes
the young people apply them in an
undiscriminating way. Many par
ents of very limited opportunities,
who had little schooling in ther
younger days, are in a position to
learn much from these young peo-
pie.
Many school children look with
contempt on parents who had poor
The children of i'm
parents often despise their
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01


thing called unsatisfied desire in the
pinched faces, the emaciated forms
of men, women and children. Over
production, it is wholly and solely
matter of production and the
grossest, rankest kind of injustice in
the distribution of the wealth that
is produced.
So we have society made up of
few inOrdinately wealthy, wealthy
beyond the dreams of aVarice, too
wealthy for their own good, and on
the other hand we have the great
mass of the people, backs bent,
hearts broken and hope dying be-
cause of the pitiful struggle for a
bare living.
When we begin to understand
what the selling price of land really
is, we will cease to boost the value
that destroys industry, and to do this
effectively, we must change our tax
ing system so that instead of taking
private property for public use,
thereby Increasing the cost of living
and adding to the difficulties of liv-
ing, we will collect this value that
society creates, and use for social
purposes and in the doing Of this,
cease to offer men premium who
hold land out of use for speculative
purposes, and in the doing of this
we will swing open the gate of Op-
portunity, justice will obtain among
men and the getting of living will
become in a little while the least
concern of life. Then could we de-
vote our thoughts and activities to
noble things instead of keeping them
nearly all on the mean, base level of
a mere animal existence.
JAMES R. BROWN.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
De@
THE FAT YEARS

W. G. Sibley, writing in the Chi
cago Journal of Commerce, thinks
that in almost every normal mans
life, there comes a period of five
years in which it is easy to make
money. He feels that people should
take advantage of those years, and
salt away good proportion of these
easy earnings which may not come
again.
Young and healthy men, without
heavy burdens, often find money
coming quite easy for a time. They
commonly spend it, confident that it
will keep coming. But such cOndi-
tions change very rapidly. They have
to meet fiercer competition, or they
have new cares, and the opportun-
ity passes, and they spend the rest
of their lives in a race between rent
day and pay day. Fat years do not
usually last, too many other people
are watching for the sources from
which they come.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
TOO MUCH LISTENING

Music is part of the happiness OF
home life. Whether we believe this
to be fact, or moi, ,9there are irrefut-
able arguments which prove the
truth Of the statement The New
York Times in an editorial on teach
ing music, stresses the Importance
of music in the public schools, and
said that Teachers College has
started an experimental class in mu-
sic designed to promote its actual
playing. This is an indirect criti-
cism of modern life.S That radio
broadcasting is encouraging what
Professor P. w. Dykema calls "the
listening habit" and discouraging
"the playing habit" has its evidences
outside of music. 1t is a question
whether children are not in danger
of losing a part of the impulse to
create simply because so much of
the creating is done for them.
Not so long ago the child was
forced to invent amusements for
himself Instead of rushing to
movie, he assembled a circus in the
back yard, or built Swiss Family
Robinson houses in the apple trees,
or cut out railroad cars with his jig
saw. Now he begs for an automo-
bile, and cannot understand the joy
his father took in owning a pony and
grooming it himself If he takes to
the water it is gasoline speed-boat
he wants and not the sailing yacht
that would call for physical exertion
and test his mental alertness and in
genuity.
Early acquaintance with mechan-
ical devices, it is true, may breed
taste for engineering. The natural
inventiveness of a youth cannot be
entirely stified, and it may be stimu-
lated by his automotive contacts.
But when one turns from the indi-
vidual to the mass, there can be lit
tie doubt that the extreme mechani-
zation of today blunts the construc-
tive imagination. Always listening"
and never playing" can lead only
to a certain sponginess of mind.
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
BETTER RURAL ROADS

After all is said and done, the out
standing fact which underlies crea-
tion of good roads, in rural districts,
and especially in the smaller towns,
is found to originate with the people
who direct the administration of the
business of the county, town or local
district. The Governor of New York
state is quoted as saying, Every
farm in time should have hard
surfaced route or road to market" "
This is undoubted the result for all
parts of the state or county, that
will be accomplished, by practical
expenditure of the money through
State Highway Commission policy,
but can not be accomplished hy high
way management by present county
forms of government.
In many towns and rural commun-
tiles poor rural roads are due not so
much 10 the lack of money, as to the
lack of intelligent road working, or
road building. No one who has trav-
elled the dirt roads from town to
town, or from county to county, can
help observing how radically the
workmanship differs. Some towns
plan their road-work systematically,
endeavoring to make lasting inn
provements. By merely patching
roads from year to year, other towns
consistently lose the value Of the
money put into the work and never
have their dirt roads in first-class
condition.
The local road superintendent un-
der county authority is a person of
importance. He has considerable
amount of money to spend each year
and enjoys a considerable local inde-
pendence. He is frequently elected
or appointed, more for his, goodfel-
lowship than for his knowledge of
road building. 1t is often difficult
to determine where his road-work
leaves off and his distribution of
petty patronage begins. For this
Milford chronicle., 1930-08-01
DISPLACED BY MACHINES

Never in the history of modern
industrial development has there
been such a rapid increase in new
machinery as in the years since the
World War closed. This is the prin-
ciple reason why the average me-
chanic is earning twice as much as
he was when the war started, al
though his cost of living is only
about so per cent more. In the long
run the change benefits everyone.
But for the time being, new ma
chinery means anxiety and some
times tragedy. The man who is
thrown out of a job because some
machine will do in a minute the
work that it has taken him five min
utes to do by hand, can see no bright
spot in the situation. The fact that
in some far distant way more work
will be made for someone by the
change, gives him no comfort for the
lack of a pay envelope. 1t is not
surprising that labor has many fears
OF scientific progress.
The change was inevitable. When
the wages of labor went up rapidly
shortly after the war, manufactur-
ers had to consider methods of
keeping their labor costs down, or
they could not produce goods at
prices at which they could be sold.
Introduction of much new machin-
cry resulted, and it has kept on.
Now the problem is what to do
with people who are displaced by
the new machines? One of the prin-
cipal difficulties is that so many of
them know only how to do just one
kind of work. 1t may be that the
state needs more schools and classes
to teach trades to adults who have
been thrown out of work by ma
chimes.
If a man could go away to some
nearby city and take a course of a
few weeks in some class where he
could learn new trade, it might be
a great help finding work. he state
needs to pay more attention to its
jobless men and women, and see that
possible is done to find
jobs for them, and to fit them for
new kinds of work.