Roanoke Rapids daily herald., 1948-09-17
Yankee Owners
Agree Impetus
Is In South

DoStoii, SSPt' A'~\EA = NSN
England's leadership in the wool
en- industry is being challenged
by the up-and-coming south.
Northern manufacturers are
largely agreed that the initiative
in mill construction and expD!'
sion has passed from the indua
try's Yankee stronghold to the
enterprising Dixie.
The trend is away from the
large, old factories so common
in New England-hard to ex,
pand and harder to moderniz:
and toward the growth q
smaller, scattered plants in the
south, operating with the latcsr
techniques and more adjustable
to change.
The greater part of the ma
tons wool textile industry--cvel
so per cents still concentrate
in New England, but spokcsine1
point out that the margin con-
stantly decreases as new mills
crop up in the south and else
where.
Discount Two Factors
Surprisingly, two of the most
widely publicized reasons for
the South's attraction to mill
owners are discounted by manu-
facturers taking a long view Of
the situation.
Many Dixie communities have
offered to exempt new factories
from taxes for a certain period
usually five years. Spokesman
in the north, however. feel this
is no great overall factor .e-
cause the south will presumably
be unable to offer that exemp-
ton indefinitely.
The other attraction. a large,
mostly unorganized labor poten-
tial, will lose its competitive 10
vantage over skilled, widely
sought labor in New England
when southern workers become
unionized - something which
northern manufacturers think
will happen before long.
On the other hand, one of the
chief factors behind the grow
ing shift, according TO one tex
tile economist, is that SO far
as production capacity is con-
cerned, the industry here Is
tradition-bound.'
Skilled Yankee workers pass
on techniques from father to son.
They are loath to change, he
says. They're set in their ways
and suspicious of new meth
DDS. They're used to producing
just so much an hour, he claims,
and they don't like to be rushed.
Along with this attitude manu-
facturers are faced with the
huge difficulties and expense
in attempting to mod
ernie and introduce new tccbni-
ques in old factories.
Start From Scatch
That's why they prefer to
start from scatch in the south,
workers who are un-
hampered by tradition in the
latest methods and building
their factories around the new
est, most efficient machines.
This economist sees another
attraction in the fact that tex
tile workers wages in the south
are generally based on those Civ
en- in the cotton and rayon mills.
The opposite holds in New Eng
land where wages are geared to
the woolen-worsted industry.
For this reason, he explains,
labor costs for a new mill in the
north zoom above those for one
in the south, where wages-in-
italy lower anyway-ars based
differently.
A third important piece in the
picture, according to his inter-
pretation, is the growing prac-
tice among Dixie cotton mills of
spinning wool in the cotton
Worsted system.
This means that the use of
wool in cotton manufacturing
processes is serving to boost the
south's percentage in the total
figures for wool production.
The long range outlook for the
Woolen industry in New Eng
land is summed up by an Off
cial of the Pacific mills in Law
renee in these words:
New England will eventually
lose its leadership in the indus
try. Wool is moving south in the
same way that cotton left this
area a few wears ago"