Western news and the Libby times. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1920-1933, 1933-01-12
OwGoveyument
How It Operates
BY William BrHckaYt
MARKET INFORMATION

IN nation that is as great as ours
In volume OF things produced,
there must In the natural course be
an enormous consumption at home OF
commodities and merchandise pro-
duced here. 1t Is essential. therefore,
that the producer of agricultural COM
moditles. the professor of those COM
modities and the distributor of them,
all must be up-to-the- minute on mar
ket data. The same Is true II 1t be
package of pins, gusher of oil.
manufacturer of automobiles, and on
through the list. So there is the need
for domestic facts and figures.
The bureau of foreign qnd domestic
commerce Is Just as thorough In its
study OF the domestic markets as 1t
was shown heretofore to be In the
assembly Of information from the for
eign field. Possibly the gathering of
information at home Is little more
simple than 1t Is abroad. but that Is
more apparent than real 1t only seems
more simple because we are more fa-
miliar with the practices of commerce
and industry here than. say In France
or Japan.
Throughout the United States, In all
of the principal cities, the department
maintains branch offices. Stationed
there are men highly trained for their
particular work. In the territory In
Which Akron, Ohio, Is located, we find
men who have intimate knowledge OF
tile tire industry. Along the sea-
experience as well as men with knoWl-
edge Of whatever other industries
make up the principal businesses OF
the area. In the vast farming areas
OF the Middle West, there are men
with intimate acquaintance with mar
kets for agricultural staples and SO on.
These men are reporting constantly
to the home Office In Washington, and
they are thus serving as advisers to
the nation as a whole since 1t Is caleu-
lated with some deilniteness that our
national consumption constitutes about
90 per cent of our production OF all
commodities put together.
Besides the field Offices. as they
are called, there are the various divi-
sions In the headquarters here with
specific jobs to do. One of them, for
example. has been engaged over a Pc
riod OF several years attempting to
find out why some grocery stores pros
per and why others alongside will fall.
Another crew has been studying the
reasons for demand In one section for
certain types of merchandise while
| another community a few hundred
| miles away wants something of diff
| ferent type.
| The bureaus domestic division has
men who are actually serving retail
businesses Of the countrysin exactly
the same way as physician treats a
patient. They point out how to avoid
wasting dollars instead OF wasting.
health; they suggest ways to attract
of building up bodily resistance to dis
| ease, as the doctor would tell his pa
/ tient. In other words, these are COM
| mercial dIagnosticians. and the rec
/ ords would seem to indicate retail
| trade is on a very much firmer founda-
| ton and that the consumer gets more
for his dollar aS result of their
1 work
Statistics constitute an important adj
i junct OF this service, as well as that
1 supplied by the foreign service, and In
| this the bureau Of the census plays
It's role In behalf OF business. 4 used
to think before knew better that all
! the bureau of the census did was to
count the noses Of the nation. but that
Is only minor part Of It's work. It
does that Job every ten years. and 1t
Is an immense task, but all Of the other
time 1t is engaged In finding out how
many washing machines were fe6.
duced last year. how many pairs OF
shoes were manufactured In the first
three months of this year, etc.
1t always has been a matter OF In
IeTeSI 10 me 10 ODSeTNG lhOSb GeuSub
statIstician sin action" They will ex-
anime a tabulaton several feet square,
spend hours doing so. From these 6g-
ures they make others Every move,
ment, however. Is towards a definite
end namely, a fact.
Here Is one result of constant cal
culation and one that illustrates bet
ter than any that comes to mind al
the moment: In the census office Is a
giant electric clocklike machine. II
has several hands, moving In clock
manner around the perimeter. and
every time this "clock" ticks. 1t records
the birth of an American citizen. In
something of the same manner, death
Is registered.
or course, that machine does not
register deaths or birth; It merely
registers figures on these vital stats
tics that represent the average number
Of deaths and the average number Of
births that have been shown to oc
cur through tabnlation of statistics.
One may say that has nothing to d.
with business. but that Is an inc0r
rect assumption. How, for instance
would manufacturers of boys clothe!
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