APRIL, 1958
Tir«$ton« MSWi
PAGE 5
AN EYE
For
AN EYE
Basic Facts Against Fallacies Help Explain
Major Points Of American Economic System
IS a poor
exchange!
PROTeCT YOURS!
In American industry, eye-safety programs have saved the
vision of more lhan 13.000 men and women over the past ten years.
Poster-reminders like this one have helped reduce the almost 300,-
000 eye accidents that occur yearly in industrial plants throughout
the nation.
Industrial Safety Programs
Save Eyesight For Thousands
The longer average life span
of Americans is pushing blind
ness in this country to an all-
time high. Dr. Franklin M.
Foote, executive director of the
National Society for the Preven
tion of Blindness, predicts that
“three quarters of a million
Americans now living are head
ed for blindness.”
Pointing out that our life ex
pectancy has increased by near
ly 50 per cent since 1900, Dr.
Foote explains that “eye diseases
striking primarily among people
over 40 are a major factor in
swelling a rise of blindness
which has already claimed 334,-
000 of our citizens.”
The great tragedy, he adds, is
that half this blindness could
have been prevented.
TO ENLIST public support
of his plea, Dr, Foote adds these
facts:
' Of America’s 36 million school
children, nine million—one in
four — need some form of eye
care.
At least one million older men
and women have the gradually
blinding disease called glaucoma,
which so stealthily reduces the
field of vision that half of the
victims are unaware of their
condition.
Some 27,000 Americans can
In Argentina
Jesse L. Williams, Mrs. Wil
liams and their two children
have arrived in Buenos Aires,
Argentina, where Mr. Williams
has assumed duties as assistant
to M. W. Brunson, Firestone
Textile Plant manager there.
Mr. Williams holds a bachelor
of science degree in textile engi
neering from Georgia Institute of
Technology. He was employed
by Firestone in March of 1957,
for foreign assignment. Since
that time until late February he
Underwent intensive training at
Firestone Textiles, Gastonia.
☆ ☆
Facts on the American system of economics are
sometimes presented in textbooks and other pub
lications in a confusing, hard-to-understand man
ner. Because of a lack of understanding, people
Some Fallacies . . .
1. That any system, other than a free produc-
tion-and-exchange system, can provide the great
est good for the greatest number.
2. That any benefits or aid whatsoever, foreign
or domestic, can come from anywhere except out
of the production of the people.
3. That Government has something to give the
people which it does not first have to take away
from the people.
4. That the workers can improve their welfare
by increasing their pay without increasing their
production.
5. That job security can be guaranteed by
management.
6. That people can measure the value of their
savings and their standard of living in dollars
when there is no control over inflation.
7. That modern mechanization causes unem
ployment.
8. That our production system should be for
use and not for profit.
in this country have developed many fallacies
of thinking on the subject.
The American Economic Foundation here lists
some of these basic principles, that you might be
informed on the facts of our economic way of
life.
9. That the law of Supply and Demand can be
repealed.
10. That management in business is paid too
much.
11. That the cost of human energy is not the
principal cost in every product and the principal
cost in every selling price.
12. That the owners of industry get the lion’s
share of the product and the workers get only
the “crumbs.”
13. That two per cent of the people own 80
per cent of the wealth.
14. That capital is money.
15. That profit is something left over after
paying the costs of production.
16. That any government-planned economy, no
matter how well-meaning, unselfish, sincere, and
intelligent the planners may be, can provide the
material welfare for all the people that they can
provide for themselves under a free production-
and-exchange system.
expect to lose their sight in
1958.
At least 300,000 eye accidents
occur yearly in industrial plants
throughout the nation.' However,
those which have instituted eye
safety programs have saved the
vision of more than 13,000 men
and women during the past ten
years.
EYE disease, accidents and
neglect are a threat to every
man, woman and child in Ameri
ca. Because of this threat. Dr.
Foote calls for a full-scale mo
bilization of the nation’s educa
tional and scientific resources to
turn the tide in the war against
blindness.
“We are spending $150 mil
lion for the care of the blind,
while allotting only $3 million
for preventive programs and
research,” the sight specialist
said.
At the turn of the century life
expectancy was about 48 years,
while children born today can
be expected to reach 70. Dr.
Foote disclosed that 50 per cent
of all blindness in this country
occurs among the 10 per cent
of the population who are over
65.
The greatest threats of blind
ness to senior citizens are glau
coma and cataract.
Glaucoma strikes two of every
100 people over 40, is particu
larly dangerous because of its
stealthy and usually painless on
set. Since its symptoms — fre
quent changes of eyeglasses,
gradual loss of side vision, vague
feeling of uneasiness—often go
unnoticed, it is imperative that
every citizen over 40 have a
competent eye examination at
least once every two years.
Cataract, which causes 17 per
cent of all blindness in the Unit
ed States, also primarily affects
those over 40. “Its only cure”.
Dr. Foote asserts, “is an opera
tion which proves successful in
nearly ninety per cent of cases.”
1. The greatest good for the greatest number
means, in its material sense, the greatest goods
for the greatest number. This, in turn, means the
greatest productivity per worker.
2. There are only two principal ways to earn
money; a) Getting paid for the use of human
energy (wages and salaries) and b) Getting paid
for the use of property (interest, dividends, rent,
and the like).
3. Government is never a source of goods.
Everything produced is produced by the people,
and everything that government gives the peo
ple it must first take from the people. Govern
ment benefits are raised through taxes. Presi
dent Franklin D. Roosevelt said that “taxes are
paid in the sweat of every man who labors.”
4. Wages are the principal cost of everything.
Because of this, wage increases (without cor
responding increases in production) simply in
crease the cost of the goods and do not improve
the welfare of the worker.
5. In our modern exchange economy, all pay
roll and employment comes from customers, and
the only worthwhile job security is customer
security. If there are no customers, there can be
no payroll and no jobs,
6. The purchasing power of money, when ad
ministered without the restriction placed on
government by the gold standard, is at the
mercy of those who control the money supply.
7. The increase of prosperity through automatic
tools has always increased the demand for the
products and increased the total number of jobs,
not only in production but in transportation, sell
ing, retailing and servicing. Use of automatic
tools may mean retraining or a change in jobs
for some workers, but never fewer jobs.
8. “Profit” and “use” do not mean opposite
things. Everything that is produced must be used
and paid for, or production must stop. Mass
production is automatically for the use of the
masses.
9. The scarcer an article (goods or service), the
higher the price of it becomes. The more plenti
ful the article, the lower the price of it. This law
of supply and demand is one of Nature’s laws
and cannot be set aside by man. Government
efforts to suspend or ignore this principle have
always led to disastrous results.
10. The success of any business depends upon
and is in proportion to the intelligence of the
management. Here again the law of supply and
demand is at work. Common unskilled labor,
because more plentiful, is cheaper than skilled
labor. Intellectual labor, because it calls for rarer
qualities, is paid, as a rule, the best. Managerial
ability, because the rarest, draws the highest
compensation. Less than three per cent of the
population have sufficient business talent to
conduct successfully any business of their own.
The 97 per cent can make a living only by
working for others. Of the three per cent, only
a very few are able to earn more than a bare
living. Business geniuses are much rarer than
one in a million. But it is on those business
geniuses that the public depends for economic
progress and prosperity.
. . . And Then, Some Facts
11. The division of income (after all costs of
production are paid) between the workers and
the investors in the manufacturing industry, is
about: 1) The cost of human energy used up in
making the products and finding customers—85
per cent; 2) The cost of human energy used up in
making and repairing the tools—10 per cent;
3) The cost of using the tools, that is the amount
to be paid to owners of the tools (investors) 5
per cent.
Thus about 95 per cent of the amount collected
from the customer is paid out to the worker. The
85 per cent is paid out just as soon (or even
before) it is received from the customer, and 10
per cent more is paid out as the tools need to be
repaired or replaced. The remaining 5 per cent
is also paid to the workers because tool owners
spend their payments for goods and services of
which additional tools are a part.
12. The amount of the product of all industry
that goes to workers is about 90 per cent. The
amount that accrues to the owners of the tools
(investors) is about 10 per cent. Yet the tools do
more than 95 per cent of the work.
13. To the worker (and to the public) it is im
material whether the capital is in a few hands or
in many: but it is of most vital interest to the
public that it accumulates in the hands of those
who can best and most skilfully use it in the in
dustries. To force capital into unskilled or other
incompetent hands is a distinct disservice to the
public.
14. Capital is tools. An accumulation of cur
rency can produce nothing. When people seek
capital to start an enterprise, it is tools that they
are after. Money is only a medium of exchange
which we hold between the time we gave some
thing up and the time we got something in its
place.
15. Profit is a definite cost of production. Just
as Wages is the amount collected from the cus
tomer on behalf of the worker, just as Taxes is
the amount collected from the customer on be
half of the government, Profit is that much col
lected from the customer on behalf of those who
supply the tools for the worker to use.
When tool payments (usually called profits)
are reduced in any way, except by Nature’s law
of supply and demand, the workers suffer for the
want of more or better tools, because it is the
tools which make it possible for them to produce
more and, therefore, get more. The high standard
of living of the American worker is due entirely
to the fact that America has the greatest stock
of tools in the world. And more and better tools
come from savings and savings come from
“profits.” Thus, any destruction of “profits” re
tards the workers’ material progress.
16. When the American Socialist Norman
Thomas was asked if he could name one single
country in which the tools of production were
operated as efficiently by The State as by private
individuals, he replied, “No, Not yet,”