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About The Omaha guide. (Omaha, Neb.) 1927-19?? | View Entire Issue (Dec. 9, 1939)
| editorials] the OMAHA GUIDE ^ Q All News Copy of Churches and Organiz- Q A ntions must be in our office not later than X X 6:00 p. m. Monday for current issue. All y y Advertising Copy or paid articles not later Q Q than Wednesday noon, proceeding date of X X issue, to insure publication. x Q Race prejudice must go. The Fatherhood X «f Gad and the Brotherhood of Man mUist pre- 'J U vail. These are the only principles which will Q Q stand the a. id test of time. A Q fames H. Will in I S y, Linotype Q Q Operators and Pressmen A X Paul Barnett, Foreman y jj Published every Saturday a: 2418-20 Grant X A Street, Omaha, Nebraska - Phone WrE. *617 U y Entered a. 2nd Class Matter March 15, 1027 y M at the Post Office at Omaha, Nobr., under X A Act of Congress of March 3, 1870. x PROGRESSIVE MERCHANDISERS SERVE U. S. • • • The consumer cooperative move ment, once w idely heruied as the per fect solution C 3 the cost of living prob lem, seems to have fallen on evil days in this country. This method of retail ing has grown slowly, w hen at all, and the volume of business judged by t;tal retail sales, is microscopic. there is a very sound reason for that—and it’s name is our competitive system of trade. The consumer goes where he gets the best service, the most for his money, and is offered the widest selection of goods from which to choose. Under our competitive sys tem, private merchandisers, of both the single and multiple type, have given the consumer a service un matched in the world. The resident of a little hamlet gets the same selection and the same goods at about the same price as the resident of a great city a thousand miles away. Every merchant is continually on his toes to meet his competitor in the next street or the next town, and the result is a steady reduction of “in between costs,” im proved services of many kinds, more advertising, increased turnover and a better break all around for the consu mer. The comparative lack of success of consumer cooperation can be as cribed to its failure tD offer the con sumer something he colldn’t get better in the ordinary way of business. Only in rare instances has it been able to undersell modern low-cost stores. The consumer has fUund no reason for de serting a highly satisfactory retail system for a more or less untried and cumbersome experiment. consumer cooperation, as many an authority has p Dinted out, has but } one chance to achieve great success in this country—and that chance is if we continue to plague regllar mer chandising with unsound, price-boost ing laws. Such laws tend to increase prices, to lower standards of service and thus to penalize the consumer. -0O0 MORE FOR YOUR MONEY • • • In this day and age, we’re used to workers of all kinc!|5 making de mands for shorter hours and pay for less work. But, believe it or not, there is one “servant” which reverses this familiar process—and which, instead, - asks for longer hours and smaller pay. That servant is electric power. In the last quarter century the cost of practically everything we use has gone steadily. Ybur dollar, for instance, now buys 30 per cent less clothing than it did in 1913. It buys 20 per cent less food. It buys 15 per cent less shelter. But there is one vital adjunct of living of which it buys a great deal more, and that is electricity. Accord ing to the U. S. Bureau of Labor Sta tistics today’s electric dollar measured in the energy it will purchase on a natonal average, is worth close to ) twice what it was worth in 1913. This has obviously saved us all a lit of money—and don’t forget that the saving was made by a heavily taxed, strictly, unregulated, delicit breeding public business. Equally im portant as the saving in cash involved is the fact that cheaper power has been a tremendous factor in improv- ' ing our living and working standards, doing away with drudgery in home and factory, and s\ increasing th out put of the worker that his wages have risen. Where the average housah Id used about 260 kilowatt-hours of elec tricity in 1913, it uses almost four times as much, 950 kii watt-hours, to day. That’s real progress—the kind of progress that is felt in every home, and can’t be adequately measured’ in dollars and cents. Yes, the much abused private electric industry has made it possible for Americans to use far more power than any other pc;pie, and to attain a standard of living far beyond that known broad. Keep that in mind next time you hear the politicams talking about the mythical “power trust.” -nOn—__ A MATTER OF ARITHMETIC The American press is largely united in a desperate drive for a bal anced federal budget. This is not strange. Ediiirs are well informed, practical observers of history in the making. They know that no nation or no government can exist indefinitely under such a profligate spending policy. They know that ruinous spend ing leads directly to national bank ruptcy, loss of individual liberty—and loss of freedom of the press. They know fully that only the weight of public opposition can curb public spending. They are not fighting a al truistic crusade. They are fighting for self preservation, and the preserva tion of our cinstitutional government which is our only safeguard of free speech and free press. And they are fighting while they still have a chance to fight. The magazine, Liberty, recently pointed out that, “American liberty as we know it and value it ab.ve all else —will end unless the deficits end. It’s a matter of arithmetic.” The federal debt on May 22, 1939 was $40,234,652. Like the mileage on a speedometer, the rising debt clicks off the distance run toward chaos. If and when that destination is reached the fight by the American press will be finished—so will freedom. --—ouo “BACK DOOR SOCIALISM” “We’ve all heard so much political denunciation of the electric utilities, that it comes as a pleasant surprise to find a public official who has examined the problem realistically and arrived at the conclusion that the cause. of prosperity isn’t served by legislative assassination of legitimate private business. Speaking on the floor of the House recently, Representative Don dero of Michigan made these pointed remarks: “In the 10 years from 1923 to 1933 the electric industry con structed in new lines and plants an average of $711,000,000 annually. In 6 years, from 1933 to 1939, the build ing average was $282,000,000 annual ly. On the basis of the previous 10 years, this was an annual building deficit of $429,000,000. Moreover, in the last 4 of these 6 years there had been a consumption of electricity far higher than in the boom days of the preceding 10 years.” Mr. Dondero wondered what caused this situation—so he went to authoritative governmental a^nd pri vate statistical records and found out. He found that in the earlier 10 years the general public invested new money in the electric business averaging $638,000,000 a year. In the last 6 years, this average dropped to $49,000,000 (a decline of well over 90 per cent) be cause of “the policy adopted by this Congress of putting the government into competition with its citizens.” Mr. Dundero summed up in these words: “The time has come when we must make up our minds whether we want prosperity in this country or whether we want back d or social ism.” The forced decline in construction oy the utilities has been responsible for an immense amount of unemploy ment. It has been responsible for an ’mense loss of potential tax revenue to government, it has, in brief, been a heavy contributing factor to pro longed depression. And here is the criux of the matter—it was the inevi table ant1 inescapable result of a suici dal, socialistic policy of reviling, ham pering and destroying wealth-produc ing, job-producing, tax-pi' ducing, op portunity - producing private enter prise. -U V / u GREEN LIGHT • • On June 5, the Supreme C urt of the United States handed down a decision of immense significance to the farmers of America. The decision upheld the constitu tionality of a Fedoral-State marketing agreement, estabiished by the produ cers of the New York milk shed h 1938, designed to further the develop ment of agricultural marketing coop eration, and to aid the farmer in get ting a fair price for his milk. The fact that the highest court in the land has thus definitely and finally upheld this policy will give the farm marketing cooperative movement a strong impetus. Its importance is not limited to New York—other groups of farmers in other states, face the same marketing and price problems. So marketing cooperation, under light. The rest is up to the farmers themselves—for after all, it will be their own work rather than political charity which will wind the clay for them. --—0O0 “An increase in the national in come to $80,000,000,000 of present day dollars Would amount to a ‘real’ in come in terms of 1929 prices of over 95 billions, or 15 per cent more than even in that boom year. Such a figure may be obtained in due time, but if the nation is to wait for it to put the federal finances in order, the outlook is not very promising.”—The New York Times. -U\JKJ RECEIVER IN BANKRUPTCY fantastic as it may appear, the possibility of Fascism in America is sufficiently alive to warrant serious consideration by all thinking citizens. William Yandell Elliot, Chairman of the Department of Government at Harvard University, recently discuss ed the growth of this form of dicta torship abroad, and finds certain defi nite ominous parallels in this country. “Fascism,” said Mr. Elliot ‘‘comes in various guises, but always as a re ceiver in bankruptcy. The bankruptcy is most obvious in the economic sphere but it betrays a more fundamental failure—the breakdown of a nation’s faith in its institutions’.’ The trend in this country toward national bankruptcy is inescapable. Within the past decade we have added more than $20,000,000,000 to the fed eral debt. Moreover, according to lat est reports, the annual cost of govern ment will rise $1,000,000,000 during the next fiscal year. Most of this staggering debt in crease, we are told, is due to the fail ure of private enterprise “to take up the slack” in the economic machine, and until it does demonstrate an abil ity and willingness bo forge ahead Re gardless of debts, confiscatory taxa tion and political attack) there can he no substantial let-up in govern ment spending. Thus we have rising deficits and a threatened breakdown of faith in American institutions—re quisities of Fascism. “Sooner or later,” concludes Mr. Elliot, “the pinch of public credit will take us into this dangerous region (chronic economic disorder). If the way out that is chosen lies along the familiar lines of Fascism, even rela tive freed m is done. Fascist disci pline tramps upon the very hands that lift it to power.” In the meantime, the politicians continue to beat business b) its knees with fanatical legislation, regulation while asking it between blows to r'ruy dr up a.ad* 11y a heavi.r and heavier Fad. •-oCo_ MCNEV AND TIME ‘‘The most useless things Robin son Crusoe s. Fayed were gold coins, ’ a F a.i economist recently, “Money has a time ut'lity. When it buys th* tilings v, e need w hen we need them most, as life insurance money d;es, its value to us is greatest.” ihere, m different words, is the old, sad, familiar ^ory to the effect that dollars needed most when they are hardest to earn—and that the money wasted by the y ung man, se cure at the height of his earning pow er, is usually beyond the frail reach of the old. N'o one knows how many people life insurance has saved from a dependent old age, hut their name is legion. They are the happy ones of this earth, who thought ahead. - Oo—_ REAL SOCIAL SERVICE Private enterprise built this na tion as we have known ana enjoyed it. It always pionered in social service. Social service was good business not alone for the benefit of the public, but because it paid dividends to the in dustries enlightened enough to pro mote it. It was part of the profit, in dividual initiative under that system, actuated by the idea of worthwhile service and the hope of a reasonable profit for meeting an unquestioned public need, has given America the greatest human advantages in the world and constitutes the backbone of America’s economic strength and op portunity. A typical example of American industry rendering such service, has been fire insurance. Nearly a century ago it accepted what might be termed the social responsibility of business to help conserve created resources of the nation. In cooperation with duly con stituted authorities it has worked consistently tj help promote fire pre vention, lessen the crime of arson, aided in obtaining adequate water supplies, efficient fire departments and better and safer building construction. As a result, capital stock company fire insurance has been able in the last 25 years alone, to reduce the average fire rate from 1.04 to 0.67. , That is real social service affect ing a common necessity, regardless of wealth, class, creed or geography. It is a record of which any industry may well be proud. , # ■-——-0O0 -~ i Vf DRINK MORE MILK The solution to the dairy problem seeks, sicply enough, increased milk consumption. According to the Dairy men’s League News of New York, if everyone over five years old drank an extra glass of milk each day, the farm ers’ annual cash milk income would increase by more than $500,000,000 or 36 per cent.