The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1932-11-15
BY WILLIS THORNTON
NEA Service Writer

BY WILLIS THORNTON
NEA Service Writer
Copyright. 1882. NEA Service. tInc.l
CUPPOSE beer came back to-
- morrow!
Would it bring jobs to millions?
Would it bring money piling into
the United States treasury?
Would it use much of our ire
mendous farm crop surplus?
Would it kill of the racketeer?
These questions have only one
honest answer. And that is, mo
body knowsl"
First in Importance in these
times are the jobs. Very enthusi-
astic claims have been made. Au-
gustuS A. (Budweiser) Busch says
100000 men. The A. F. Of L.
estimates 100000. Other esti-
mates have run up as high as
100000 for the brewing and al
lied trades.
Well, let's see. In the last pre-
prohibition census, 1914, about
10000 men we're employed in
brewing, and roughly 10000 in
the retail trade SALOONS, barten-
ders, etc.. There were perhaps
10000 in the allied trades of bot
ties, corks, barrels, etc. Now that
makes only a little more than
100000 men working at beer and
brewing in 1914.
OF course, the country is bigger
now, but it is also true that ma
chinery has improved in brewing
as vel as in so many other lines,
and would replace many of the
jobs Of 1914. Many states as such
would remain dry, even though
national prohibition were abol-
iShed.
Nobody knows whether the new
generation of drinkers, whose
taste has been educated to the
strong connections of the bootleg
era, would drink as much beer as
their fathers did. So it takes a
lot Of optimism to bring the jobs
above a half million at most, and
1t might even fall as low as the
1914 figure of 100000.
Against this gain, however, you
must set off a good share of the
speakeasy proprietors, bartenders,
bootleggerS, delivery boys, truck
men, hijackers, and prohibition
agents Who have jobs under the
present regime.
MAYBE you don't like to think
I've of those as jobs, but they are,
and many of them would vanish
if beer became legal. The fed
eral government alone has been
arresting $4,000 a year, so you can
guess how many escape.
The bootleg industr-.-, further, is
decentralized, has small-unit pro-
duction is inefficient. The organ
lied brewery is centralized, has
big-unit production, is most eff
Gent.
Even that might be a clear gain.
because the jobs would be honest
and legal and above-board. But
that is a gain in the quality of
jobs, not the quantity.
The point is that the expected
gain in jobs through beer ap-
parently has been exaggerated
greatly; nobody knows what the
net gain in the number of Jobs
would be, though the gain in con-
ditionS of those jobs is unques-
tionable.
Now how about money? The
government, with a huge deficit
and running behind about a half
billion every year, needs money
badly. Will beer bring it in?
Here there is general agreement
that beer will bring the govern
ment a lot Of money. But how
much? The Association Against
the Prohibition Amendment says
a billion year. So does the
New York Hotel Mems Associ-
alton.
John j. Raskob recently esti-
mated a billion year, including
light wines. The Investment Bank
ers' Association says $75O,O0O,000.
TN 1919, just before prohibition,
Il the beer tax had been boosted
to Sc barrel. That tax, by the
way, still is in effect, never having
been repealed. At that rate it is
estimated that beer would bring
in some $3O0,O0O0OO.
. There would be a saving on the
millions being spent annually for