The Western news. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1933-current, 1941-07-10
Consumers Should Know
~ THE BENEFITS OF FREE
COMPETITION

fort. They find the hard way to be
too hard and they think it would
be better If conditions were made
a little easier by cutting down or
controlling the competition.
Perhaps we shouldn't blame them /
too much, especially those who
might have to go out of business
unless something is done to tighten
their burden. It is always bad to
have even few bankruptcies and |
abandoned enterprises. But it is
worse to interfere with the vital
forces that make business 70, and
to change the rules so that there
will be no further progress. BY
eliminating competition we might
save temporarily a few crippled
bushes enterprises, but the gem
eral public would eventually have
to pay for it in higher prices or
poorer goods, or both.
Almost every proposal to reduce
competition is short sighted.
Brought forth to solve a pressing
difficulty of the moment, it does
harm in the long run--harm to con-
sumers and harm to business as a
whole. Nevertheless, devices for
this purpose are constantly being
proposed and some of them are in
actual operation now, at the pres
ent moment
| One large group of such meas
ures for cutting down certain
kind Of competition is the surpris-
ing collection of State laws setting
up barriers against interstate trade.
, Many of our citizens probably do
not even know that this sort of
thing exists. 1t is an amazing
thing, that in this great country
which is supposed to be single
economic unit with goods moving
freely from points in Maine to Cal
ifornia and from Florida to the
State of Washington, more than
half the states have passed laws
restricting, in one way or another,
the competition of outside bust
nesses with firms located within
the state.
/ While it is unconstitutional for
states to set up actual tariff bar
riers, some of them have done al
most the same thing in the guise of
measures supposed to protect
health, public safety, or natural
4 resources, and through ingenious
use Of taxing powers. In addition,
the purchasing departments of some
states are required by law to buy
from firms within the state Wher-
ever possible, even if their prices
are higher than quotations from
outside concerns. v
Many states have inspection laws
and labelling laws which make it
next to impossible for certain prod
ucts from outside their boundaries
to compete with those produced in
side the state. Another device for
reducing out-of-state competition
is the assessment of prohibitive fees
and licenses on trucks coming into
the state.
Fortunately, this matter of inter
state trade barriers is now being
studied by representatives of Fed
eral and State governments, and il
is to be hoped that remedies will
be undertaken 1t is a most prom
Using sign that various state au-
thorities are themselves beginning
to see that something must be done
to remove these barriers.
Another set of laws aimed at de-
stroying a particular form of com
petition is the series of chain-stort
tax measures. The numerous stat,
taxes on chains, and especially tn,
proposals for Federal law of thi
type, are designed to hamper ans
. even to eliminate this particula
) kind OF store, solely because othe
stores want less competition. Chair
!, stores have forced others to b
: more efficient, to make their owl
, stores more attractive, and to SCI
on a smaller margin; and with thes
improvements, wide-awake indie
: pendnet merchants have been abb
/ to compete very successfully. How
: ever, many of them prefer to hav
i the chaln-store competition elimi
!. mated through punitive taxes.
Then there are a great many sta,
= laws called flair trade acts som
< OF which are not fair at all Par
r OF these laws are constructive in il
= tent, but the general effect of mo
! OF them is to lessen the free con
e petition of manufacturers and me
chants and to relieve them SOM
n what from the stern struggle Fl
IS better goods, lower prices, ar
" more efficient distribution.
10 From time to time, there ha'
t. been attempts at price-fixing. Tt
j. is one of the worst forms Of cor
f. petition-killing 1t is almost I