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About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (May 30, 1913)
VFi '"rr'T w. 4 In Jf The Commoner. ' VOLUME 13, NUMBER n The Commoner. ISSUED WEEKLY Entered fit tlio PoHtotllco at Lincoln, Nebraska, na Bucond-clttHB matter. William J. Hiivam Kdltorniul Proprietor lliaiiAiti U. Mmv.AWK AocJtitc Kdllor ClIAm,KS W. IlllYAH Publisher Kdllnrlnl Rooms and Tluslncm onicc, 324330 Hon th 12th Street One Yenr $1.00 Nix Monthn HO In Clubo of Flvo or more, por year.. .73 Three lUonthn 25 Single Copy 05 Sample Coplco Free. Foreign Post. 52c Extra. SlJIlSCliii-TiONS can bo sent direct to Tho Com moner. They can also bo sent through newspapers which have advertised a clubbing rate, or through local agents, whero sub-agents havo been ap pointed. All remittances should bo sent by post ofllco money order, express order, or by bank draft on New York or Chicago. Do not send Individual checks, stamps or money. UMM3WAI.S Tho date on your wrapper shows tho time to which your subscription Is paid. Thus January 31, '13 means that payment has been re ceived to and Including the last issue of January, J013. Two weeks aro required after money has been received beforo tho date on wrapper can bo changed. OIIANGI3 OF A DDIIRSS Subscribers requesting a change of address must glvo old as veil as new address. AnvuiiTlsiNG Rates will bo furnished upon application. Address all "ommunicatlons to THE COMMONER, Lincoln, Neb. freo and clour. Ho has no personal notes out , standing. During the year he has spent $25,000 cash In putting an addition on his store. Ho ronta his dwelling, paying a rental of $1,200 a year. "How much income tax does he havo to pay? "First, as to his business, ho will be liable only for a tax on tho not income, and this he will calculato vory much as ho would do for himself if there woro no income tax. That is, he will deduct necessary expenses incurred in carrying on tho business, interest accrued and payable during tho year on indebtedness, all taxes (ex cepting, of course, tho income tax) for the year, losses from fire or other accidont not covered by insurance, bad debts written off tho books a reasonable allowanco for wear and tear in his store, but no additional allowanco for restoring ouch wear and tear, and no allowance for per manent improvements made to increase the value of his property. "Ho finds that his business expenses for the year were $74,000; his indebtedness on the mortgage Is $2,500; all losses were covered by insurance; bad debts were $500; wear and tear amounted to $1,000; taxes were another $1,000. From the gross income from his dry goods busi ness, then, tho law allows him to deduct the sum of these amounts, or $79,000. "Tho rent which he receives from the two apartment houses comes from twenty tenants, each of whom pays $1,000 a year. The tax on this part of his income can not be held by tho tenants for payment at source, since they would be required to withhold it only in case each paid more than $4,000 a year. He mustthere fore, state this income from rents in his re turn and pay tho tax thereon himself. As to the dividends, his income from the first corporation is $500; from the second and from the third $25. Corporations are subject to the normal income tax of one per cent on their net incomes, and since none of these sums, nor all of 'them 'together, exceed tho normal in come limit of $20,000 for individuals, Mr A -- personally does not have to pay any income tax on this part of his income. It is paid for him at ,5J ra,tQ of ,one por CQnt y UlQ corporation. The law gives Mr. A , as a taxable per son, an exemption on $4,000. , "H,e Isof courso entitled to make no reduc tion for the rent of $1,200 that he pays for his dwelling, or for household expenses. ut "To-?llm up tho income personally taxable to him; Mr A-- would hftVe a net Dusi j ' Sme5i nnX'00T.froml8 a?artmt houses; in t all, $41,000. From this, bo will deduct tho amount of his exemption, namely, $4,000 leav ing $37,000 as his net income subject to tax. On h9n Sn Mi f tUiS !Um (that ,s e st t $2Q,000, less the exemption), he will have to 2n Jno per cent or ?!60. On the remaining $17,000 he will have' to pay an additional ono per cent making two per cent or $340. His total income tax will thus be $500." El Paso (Tex ) Are $300,000,000 Worth Saving? The Opportunity and the Work Done by the Economy and Efficiency Commission at Washington By R. E. Coulson, in "System," tho magazine of business. Reproduced through the courtesy of tho publishers of "System." Every business man knows that in the long run ho must get back at least one dollar for every ninety cents he pays out, or shut up shop. Yet in tho federal government, the biggest enter prise in the United States, which spends a bil lion dollars annually, there is no such direct re lation between expenditure and returns. Every manager knows that the chief spur to efficiency to industry to time and labor-saving is competition. Wastes tend to grow with monopoly, as the necessity for strict economy disappears, unless there is corresponding effort to check and control these wastes. In the big gest business in America an absolute monopoly there has been no such incentive and few such checks. Every employer knows that uncertainty of tenure kills initiative and weakens the adminis tration of departments. New heads lack the detail knowledge necessary to suggest improve ments in methods; subordinates lack the author ity or the urge to make betterments. With shifting executives and a stationary force, the only safeguard against inefficiency is the work ing out of standard, straight-line methods for handling routine. For lack of such standard methods, our government departments waste, perhaps, $300,000,000 every year. The commission on economy and efficiency had only started this work of analysis and standardi zation when its appropriation was cut, its activi ties discouraged. Some of the extravagances it found and prescribed correctives for are listed here, and in articles to follow. That its work should be abandoned and the reorganization of the government's business be halted now would be a serious and costly mistake. To congress and to all readers of System, we commend the commission's purpose and urge continuance of its important work. Typical of the work performed by the com mission and the possibilities of other work which it may do, is its study made of the methods of handling correspondence. "While a general in quiry pertaining to the organization and work was necessary to an intelligent consideration of details," the commission explains, in its report, the ultimate purpose of the investigation was to recommend changes in business method and technique that would result in increased effi ciency or savings. The commission haB taken the same point of view on the government work that any business man would take on his own organization." Its methods of approach, there fore, besides their intrinsic Interest, have an application in th0 average office. .nf Je?ru5?7' 1911' a circular form was sub mitted to the various administrative divisions designed to bring out complete inf ormation about existing methods of handling and filing corres pondence. This was chosen as the first point of attack because the operations are common to all departments and the conditions, in many re spects, aro tho same. y Detailed questions in regard to the processes employed in handling correspondence Terl grouped under the following headings Incoming Correspondence: A. Receiving and Opening. B. Briefing. C. Recording and Indexing. D. Distributing. , Outgoing Correspondence: "V E. Preparing. ' F. Briefing. G. Recording and Indexing. H. Copying. I. Dispatching. General: J. Filing incoming letters and copies of out going correspondence. The answers to these questions give a df n- and relatively accurate picture of office methods In the service, so far as handling correspondent is concerned. As a result of this inquuiry and a study of tho methods of private ennomio ?i, commission issued, in February ?K 3 S' the liminary report Presenting thTfesuYts 'and set ting forth the principles which, they bellow should govern tho handling and filing of rnr respondence. The commission dealt, of romT with tremendous totals. Tho departments in Washington receive annually 43,000,000 com munications and dispatch 22,000,000, makln? a total of 65,000,000 communications handled each year. Yet much of the constructive criti cism and suggestion offered in tho report an. plies as well to the average large or small busi ness. In dealing with filing problems, for instance the commission's recommendations recognize the difficulty of devising a system whoso details satisfy all conditions, and the necessity of adapt ing the system to the needs of each particular office. Its analysis of the principles of filing and the things to be considered in developing a system are fundamental: (a) Certainty of obtaining a particular paper or all the papers relating to a particular subject. This certainty to be independent of tho time elapsed since filing of the papers. (b) Rapidity of obtaining a particular paper or group of papers. This rapidity to be only slightly affected by the time which has elapsed since filing. (c) Rapidity with which documents may be filed. (d) Cheapness of operation. (e) Simplicity. (f ) Reduction to a minimum of the space re quired. (g) Miscellaneous requirements and desir able features, such as cross references, number ing, and so on. In this preliminary investigation, the commis sion made very practical recommendations. Cor respondence in many offices was found folded twice the long way and filed in document files with tho contents "briefied" on the backs. Vertical fiat filing the practice almost uni versal in business was the first recommenda tion. This automatically would do away with briefing and make a saving of no less than $90, 000 in clerk hire. In a vertical file, any letter would be as accessible, and its contents as easily grasped at a glance, as though its contents had been briefed on a jacket. Of the two hundred and. fifty filing systems studied in the various departments the commis sion found few where the classifications were either logical or scientific. The usual method seemed to be a numerical finding system, which requires an extended numerical sequence, each new file receiving the number following the last. This has the advantage of allowing additions only at the end of the file, but it fails to render the files self-classifying. Subsidiary records a book or more often a card .index have to he used. Since papers on the same subject aro widely separated, the danger of burying im portant papers leads to laborious and expensive cross:indexing. The commission advocates the application of the card-index principle to the filing of letters. In other words, the letters themselves should be sectionalized and classified. The adoption of a subjective classification of correspondence, based on the Dewey decimal system of library classification, is also proposed. This has been largely adopted in private business in the last ten years. After a thorough investigation, it was recom mended that all correspondence, 'incoming ani outgoing, should he filed upon a. subject classi fication arranged as nearly as possible on a selr indexing basis. When numbers for each file were essential, it was recommended that a deci mal system be employed. The proposed system is very flexible and can be adapted to varied subjects. The classification numbers tell of each letter or file of correspondence both what it 13 and where It is, New topics arising can be close ly related to existing heads merely by adding a decimal place. All papers on one subject aTO kept together and are preceded and followed oy allied subjects. "No book or card record of Incoming or out going correspondence should be made except where absolutely essential, and all bound-boos registers of correspondence received and sent vVH