Evening star., 1944-12-07

president of the Studebaker Corp.
has Just issued the report under the
title 1.-TWO Years of Progress" The
report not only admits that the Gel
has been engaged in planning, but
takes pride in the fact. 1t speak:
of two years of substantial accom-.
plishment in stimulating such plan.
ming" 1t calls for "even more in
tensified planning"
Reminiscent of the sad com.
plants of the early New Dealer:
when they were castigated for theil
efforts at planning, the report re-
calls that in the atmosphere of two
years ago, work on postwar prob.
lens was not generally popular
activity. Many even considered II
unpatriotic and almost subversive.
Nevertheless" says the report, "the
founders of the CED had an un-
swerving faith in eventual victory
and it saw clearly the need for in
tensive advance planning to help
business do its part in meeting the
complex problems which this coun-
try would face after victory"
Methods Once Abused.
As for brain-trusting, the CED Is
engaged in that much abused busi-
ness up to its neck A roll call OF
its brain trusters, listed in the re-
port, would reveal these names
among others:
j. M. Clark, professor of econom-
les, Columbia University; Charles C.
Abbott, associate professor of busi-
ness economics, Harvard; Richard
A. Lester, associate professor of eco
nomics, Duke University; T. w
Schultz. professor of agricultural
economics, Chicago University; CAL
win B. Hoover, dean of the Gradu-
ate School of Arts and Sciences,
Duke University; DR.. A. D. H. Kap-
Ian, professor of economics, Denver
University; DR.. Harold M. Groves,
professor of economics, Wisconsin
University There are several more,
including Robert R. Nathan and
Gardiner C. Means, former New
Deal brain-trusterS.
All of which doesn't prove thing
except that businessmen who once
regarded New Deal methods as either
outrageous or absurd, if not both
have come around to the adoption
of those same methods. That is not
fair statement, either. 1t is better
to say that the businessmen repre-
sented in the CED-and it is a
representative list of Americas best
have come to recognize the serious
need for making positive plans on a
national scale if the tremendous
problems of the postwar era are to
be met and that, in such planning,
good use can be made of men in the
academic world.
On the whole, the report is a re-
freshing document. Nowhere in its
% long pages can you find the
phrase free enterprise" Private
enterprise" does appear once, but it
is not used as a political or religious
slogan.
Urges Cooperation.
This is not to say that the CED
doesn't believe in free or private
enterprise; only to say it is not silly
on the subject. 1t recognizes that
no important element in American
society is advocating anything ex-
cept system of free enterprise.
But, seeing the present goal as a
30 to As per cent increase in national
output, with resulting 100000 tt
100000 new jobs, and believing
that this expansion must come pri-
marily through action of the Ma
tion's 100000 business employers
the CED considers it "self-evident
that business cannot do this jot
alone" Or, putting it another way
Businessmen cannot be charged
with the sole responsibility for such
achievement" Instead, says the
report, 1t should be a cooperative
undertaking in which business, labor
agriculture and Government all dc
their maximum share.
The Committee for Economic De-
velopment, energized by Mr.. Hoff-