The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-05-26

Leon Henderson'S Office of Price Administration and Civilian Supply is cutting across other defense agen- cies to work squeeze play on man. ufacturerS and effect pincer en- circlement of the private business man.
 At the same conference. Walter B. Weiscnburger, executive vice president of N. A. M., stating that the proposals to extend price con- trol were based on a belief that manufacturers can fix their prices at any level they desire, made :he point that the price tags on man. ufactured products were based on at least 25 different factors, nearly oil beyond the control of the manufac- turer.
 Fuller declared that America needs to be shocked into Q realiza. ton of what Is going on. Since Wei- senburger's 26 factors form 6 con- venient check list, and since they have not previously been released for publication, here is Q chance to see how much free play of economic forces there is going to be and to see how far the Henderson OPACS outfit has gone or Is going. First, the Weisenburg list of % factors determining price:
 1, material costs; 2, labor costs; 3, taxes; 4, research costs; {, com petitor's price; 6, competitors action If price change Is made; 2. price of substitute; 8, prices in alternative fields of expenditure; 9, custom; 10, quality; Ii, novelty; l2, perishability of product: i3, style; i4, necessity of announcing prices it advance; IS, anticipated production costs for long -range delivery on contract; 10, price change effect on volume of sales; 17, demand for service; IS, domestic supply; 10, international market; 20, brand name appeal; q, good will; @, risk; 23, cost of re- placement; 24, tariff protection; 25, buyers desire to speculate on future sale.
 DEBATE STARTS HERE
 To the untraincd eye that lIst may look q little padded. Domestic supply, for example, ig 6 matter Of material costs.
 It has been cortcnded that before any government price fixing there should be hearings before c coinnlis. sion and there should xeiSt Q gpe- cific right of court review to deter mine whether the price IS confisca- tory.
 You can imagine what would hap pen, however, If determination of the price Of beans, bullets or battle- wagons could be fixed only after hearings and court review. The war would be over before the price tag was made out. So you can with aS- surance kiss that factor goodby. Prices will be fixed first and the hearings and court review will come later, with retroactive correction whenever possible.
 Individual situations will be dealt with as they arise, and if prices be- have, there may not De any price fixing. The whole setup is designed to prevent ipflation and what hap pened in the last war, when Whole- sale prices doubled and the price Of arining ct least Sl6 billion high- CT than necessary.
 For instance, the main job Of OPACS now is to keep down the price of raw materials. That iS cer- tainly a factor working to the ad- vantage of the manufacturer. ROW OVER LABOR COSTS
 There is confusion, to put 1t mild aSa kfaA ktag aR ia hap nAata M A. M. charges that labor costs, larg- est factor iil manufacturing, have increased substantially. On the oth- CT hand, if the labor organizations own figure of @480 million anual wage increases Is correct, and they would hardly minimize 1t, that rep- reSents 6 1 per cent increase to the estimated annual wages and salary figure of $48 billion.
 There is considerable uncertainty about the extent to which taxes will be allowed to influence price, since they will not be considered a factor in determining wages. Because the little man will be taxed more is not considered reason for paying him more wages, and, the effort will be made to apply the same principle 10 manufacturing costs.
 Brand name, good will, style, quality, novlety and custom are. ir- tangibleS in which 1t would be diffi- cult for any price fixing agency to deal. Those items, like some 20 oth- CTS on the list, deal largely with consumer goods and so far the iin- pact of the OPACS organization has not been felt on consumer goods. It has enough to worry about in machine tools and raw materials.