Newspapers / The Times-News (Hendersonville, N.C.) / Jan. 31, 1919, edition 1 / Page 2
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.i. uilLILiRSIuilAL Last week we published some facta in regard to the prevalence of high price in spite of the existence of unprecedented quantities of supplies on hand. We pointed out that, with the supply of labor increasing and the demand for labor - decreasing, there was grave danger of acute Buffering, and that unless some relief was found, there would probably be bread lines, and perhaps starvation, in the larger cities. The plain fact is that unemploy ment is increasing at a dangerous xate, and therefore this is a peculiarly unfortunate time to permit the arti ficial boosting of food prices. The following dispatch, sent to the New York Herald, by its Washington cor respondent, shows the danger ahead: Unemployment in the United States has reached an alarming stage and daily is becoming worse. Officials of the United States em ployment service are putting forth tremendous efforts to solve the prob lem, but are unable to reach its basic cause. The general trend of the situation acknowledged as "dangerous," and unless checked is likely to reach a crisis in February of the most far reaching seriousness. This conclusion is justified by in formation given to the Herald today by officials of the United States Em ployment service and by information furnished by the Bureau. "I believe the problem can be solved," said N. A. Smyth, assistant director general, "but its general trend today is extremely dangerous. The area of unemployment is spread ing the numbers of the unemployed are constantly increasing. The re newing of business activity will solve the problem, for there is a natural labor shortage in the country and the whole situation depends upon when the normal activities of the country will be resumed. The next few weeks will be the critical period." 210,000 Men Unemployed The surplus of labor over employ ment is increasing daily, having moved from 11,000 in a group of representative cities on January 14, to approximately 210,000 today. The area of unemployment is spreading all over the country, starting in Maine, running on a line along the northern tier of States to Minnea polis. Starting again in Montana, it jumps to the coast and back again, through the Southwestern and South ern States. Daily reports received by the National Employment service show this condition increasing with every twenty-four hours. In the area of unemployment, Pennsylvania is in the best condition, showing a shortage of labor instead of a surplus. But this shortage has been scaled down daily. On Decem ber 21 Pennsylvania had 11,600 op portunities for laborers. In the week ending December 28 this number went down to 10,700. For the week of January 7 the number fell to 6,082. The week ending January 14 showed the number still decreased, to 4,282, while this week the figures have reached 1,200. At this rate next week will show a larbor surplus in Pennsylvania, making the iron ring of unemployment around the United States complete. New England States are in the fore ground, with conditions especially bad in Connecticut. Further west, Ohio is in a thoroughly alarming condi tion, with its industrial centers filled with the unemployed. Next Few Months Crucial Conclusions reached by officials of the unemployment service, govern ment officials and members of Con gress generally are:- That the increase of unemploy ment is dangerous and must be stop ped to avoid disaster. The next few months are crucial and capital must be employed to furnish employment during these months or face disastrous conditions in the months following. The government must devote it self to the problem of reconstruction and make up for the absence of pre paredness for peace and for the lapse of time, since the armistice dur ing which time the problem of re construction has been ignored. A ministry of reconstruction, or the organization of a congresssional or executive commission whose busi ness it shall be to study and solve the problem which confronts the country most be established. Demobilization of the army must be conducted on an idustrial rather than on a unit basis, so that men needed in industry may go first and those without jobs may be retained in the service. Active encouragement should be grrva w me erecuon oi puimc buildings and the construction of public works. Cosiness men must be forced to ' te&Hzatidn of the fact that .the solution of the problem rests with them, and patriotism and intelligent self-interest should prompt the active use of every available dollar in in' dustry. ' ' . : . : Natural Labor Shortage , Officials of the United States Em ployment service, acknowledging the imminent danger of a situation which may become overwhelming if not checked, believe that efforts properly directed will avert a disaster. They say that the situation is largely in the hands of business and of capital and rests upon the decision when it shall be wise to embark upon the re construction enterprises that will fol low the war. In spite of the fact there is a con stantly increasing army of unemploy ed, there is a natural labor shortage in the country which is found to as sert itself as soon as the country is readjusted. During the last four years immigrants to the United States were fewer by 2,225,000 than in the preceding fqur years. Half a million men have been diverted into shipbuilding from other industries. Conditions in Europe and the speed of demobilization probably will re tain more than a million men n the tain more than a million men in the shortage of 4,000,000 men compared with the period preceding the Euro pean war. With the natural shortage of labor it is believed there will be np diffi culty in placing the country on a peace basis, provided the next few months can be bridged over. The reason for the present crisis are clearly evident. The long delay in establishing peace in Europe has had a tendency to increase the feel ing of doubt in the minds of business men. There will be no sure adjust ment of America on a peace basis until the rest of the world has taken its part in the world of commerce. Further, until peace is signed there is always the possibility, remote thuogh it may be, of a resumption of hostilities. Buiinesi Men Holding Back With these elements of uncertainty before them government officials and business men are holding back until they can forecast the future more accurately. The general public is holding back from buying because of a hope that prices will go down, and jobbers and retailers are holding back for fear that exactly this will hap pen. Private building construction is being held back because of the same reasons of uncertainty. The result is uncertainty and indecision which is keeping the wheels of in dustry still while the army of peace is becoming constantly larger. When the armistice was signed no general program of reconstruction had been outlined, and President Wil son's trip to Europe, where he is en gaged with the tremendous repson sibilities of the peace conference, has delayed the elaboration of any reconstruction program with the ex ception of the presentation of that of Franklin K. Lane, secretary of the interior, for a return-to-the-land movement. The result of this has been that while the United States employment service has been doing its best to find jobs for the jobless, legislative assistance or the application of any policy of reconstruction has been lacking. As the number of men seeking jobs increases over the num ber of jobs available, the activities of the employment service or any of the numerous State agencies that are at work, while remedial, will not solve the problem. -Labor Surplus Growing The general increase of the area of unemployment by States in shown in the chart of the employment ser vice. On December 21 only six States in the Union showed a surplus of labor. Today there are twenty such States. In States where" there is still a shortage it is constantly de creasing. On January 7 the State of New York had a labor shortage of 1,599. In two weeks that shortage has changed to a surplus which is constantly growing. The States which show a surplus of labor and a shortage of jobs, as now reported, are Arizona, Califor nia, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Lousisiana, Massachus etts, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Utah, Vermont. The number of cities showing a surplus of labor is rapidly increasing. During the present week fifty new cities have been added to the list, At the same time those centers re porting a labor shortage have been rapidly diminishing. December 3 twenty-eight cities reported a labor shortage. On January 28 this num. ber had decreased to fifteen. Many returning soldiers, even with jobs, open for them in their home cities, refuse to return there, prefer ring to , establish themselves in the larger and more attractive cities. The result is a congestion in these cities, which increases the problems of the government.' ' Another group is find ing its way to Florida, attracted by the climate, and still more refuse to accept the wages for which they were accustomed to work upon their en listment. ' Many munition workers have been employed and paid at the rating of skilled mechanics, although they did purely mechanical jobs which re quired no particular skill. These men refuse to accept a lower wage than they received as "skilled mechanics," and their lack of skill makes it dif ficult for them to find employment except as common laborers. Alter Demobilation Methods Methods used by the General Staff in demobilizing by units has had a tendency to dump into the industrial centers many men from whom no jobs are waiting. There is evident a gen eral tendency toward a changed method of demobilization, which will have the effect of releasing men as they are needed. Much of the difficulty of the Gen eral Staff in this respect is due to the pressure brought to bear on Con gress and through Congress. Men who are retained in the army believe those released will have the pick of the jobs, while the contrary is prob ably true, as the "pick of the jobs" will not come until industry has been generally renewed. THOSE "REDUCED" TOLLS (Greensboro News.) "There are still states in the Uni ted States," remarks the New York Tribune referring to the action of certain states to prevent Postmaster General Burleson from putting into effect his alleged "reduced" telephone toll rates, which, it is claimed, are really advances. Continuing the Trib bune says: "This fact Mr. Burleson has chosen to ignore, and it has been necessary for some 10 or 12 of these component and somewhat independ ent parts of the Union to remind him of it. They have refused to sanc tion the new telephone rates fixed by Mr. Burleson's department. It will be recalled that a few weeks ago a communique from that department advised the country that a "sweep ing reduction" in toll line charges was to be made. The mathematics of the the order were too complicated for immediate comprehension and great was the astonishment of the telephone using public to find that the Burleson "adjustment" in many cases actually advanced toll rates. The public utilities commissions of New Jersey, Michigan and other states have stepped in to postpone the "adjustment." "The whole Burleson procedure has worn a curious and elusive aspect. The seizure of the telephones may have been needful and wise, though the fact was never clear. But no one has yet been able to understand the mystery of the cables, seized sur reptitiously when the war was virtually at an end. "Seeming defects of candor, added to a certain distrust of Mr. Burle son's ways, have nurtured a suspicion of the whole performance. Here, as in the case of the railways, the great economies hoped for have seemed al' most equally illusory, and the net result appears to be an increase in stead of a lowering of the cost to the public." The further the country goes into control and operation of public utili ties the greater the cost to the people and more inferior the service. If the Republican Congress which comes in to being on March 4 does nothing more than to disentangle the rail and wire muddle and put an effective stop to the romancing and experimenting of the Postmaster General it will have been worth while. BIG PROFITS OF PACKERS Packers' profits in the first three years of the war were from three to five times as large as their profits in the three years preceding the war. In 1917, the first year of Ameri can participation in the war, the profits of the "Big Five," including the Armour, Swift, Morris, Cudahy and Wilson interests, ranged from 19.3 per cent for Armour to 33.4 per cent for Swift. . The total profits of the "Big Five' grew from $22,108,000 in 1914 to $95,639,000 in 1917. These are some of the develop ments in the Senate agriculture com' mittee hearings on the Kendrick Meat Control bill, as a result of in vestigations made by Stuart Chase, of Chicago, expert accountant for the federal trade commission and the food administration. During his testimony Chase de clared that neither he, the commis sion nor the packers, themselves know what the profits of the packers really are because of their method of handling subsidiary .companies, the addition of profits to capital expendi tures, charging them to profit and loss, and so on. Chase commented that, even tinder food administration regulations, the packers made as much money as before,' though these regulations may have prevented then from boosting their profits above former records. Some Interesting Figures Chase, during the course of his testimony, offered some interesting figures. He showed . that, during 1914, Armour profits amounted to $7,640,000, as against $27,137,847. Swift in 1914 made $9,661,000, against S47.236.000 in 10171 Mail ris in 1914 made $2,206,000 and $8,- uz,uuu in uudahy in 1914 made $1,402,000 and in 1917 $4, 935.000. Wilson and inmmi muAa $8,319,000 in 1917. Mr. Chase further reported that oresidents and vice nniHnhi nf packing concerns receive salaries ranging irom sou,uuu to. S1Z5,000 and have sources of income as offi cers of Subsidiary . cnmnnniesL TTo estimated that in a single year the pacKers expended more than $50,000 to influence legislation and many thousands of dollars to ohtnin f nvnr. able publicity. GERMANY TRIES POPULAR ELECTION (Greensboro News.) It is interesting to note with what energy the German voters entered in to their first election after am un trammeled franchise became theirs. Until the overthrow of the Hohon zollerns the German voter was a rather negligible creature. In the first place the vote was denied to a great number of persons entitled to it, and then many in the upper class es were the possessors of from three to five votes. There was plenty of plural voting, not enough pf popular voting. But this time millions crowd ed to the polls, men and women. Election day and the days just preceding it were great days for the bill posters. Berlin was plastered with signs, extolling the merits of the different candidates and parties; the streets were covered with dodgers, pamphlets and handbills. The news papers were considerably put out be cause all the available paper stocks were used up for that purpose. The election was quite a public affair. The voters had plenty of parties to tie to; Centrists, German National ists, German Democrats, Majority Socialists, Independent Socialists, Peoples Party, Citizens League. The women seem to have shown great zest. Unlike the women of America they did not have to beg or threaten for the vote; it was thrust upon them, and they seized it with great zest. It was a bad day for vot ing, the weather being out of tune .which somehow is characteristic of the weather on election days but this was a small thing to these husky German women after what they had gone through in the last few years, things like loading freight cars and the like. It is true that some of them showed a little too much zeal. Some ladies took the inmates of an idiot asylum to the polls and voted them en bloc, but things like that are somehow a concomitant of democracy and the yearning for up lift via the ballot box. The German women are learning fast. Besides indicating the interest of the Germans in a republican form of government, the election is an indica tion of the extreme thoroughness with which they go at anything. Here was something new, and like a child with a new toy they take it up whole soulfully, with a complete outfit of parties and creeds. And if there is any comfort to be derived from any German doings it is in the fact that the Spartacans, those Teutonic Bolsheviki, were com pletely flattened out. An admitted minority, they will not be allowed to run wild in Germany, which makes the problem of the peace makers at Versailles that much easier. Pluck, promptness and perserver ence are three essentials of success. A definite, logical plan is what brings results, big results, too, when put into operation. Remember this. NOTICE OF SALE OF LAND FOR PARTITION Under and by virtue of the author ity conferred upon me by a dcreee of the Superior Court of Henderson County, North Carolina, in the case of H. D. Hyder and L. S. Hyder against W. V. Brock and wife Brock; Virginia Ferguson and hus band, Eugene Ferguson: Janie Keno ley and husband, James Kenoley; Laura Clark and husband, J. M Clark; Sallie Townsend, and husband, M. W. . Townsend; Clio Haskins, and husband, F, H. Haskins; Bettie Clark and husband, J. W. Clark.; Neoma race ana husband, J. M. Pace; T. J. Brock and wife, Lillian Brock; and J. J. Justice and wife, Violet Justice, I will sell at the court house door in Hendersonville, N. C, at 1 o'clock p. m., on the 3rd day of March, 1919, it being the first Monday in said month, at public auction to the high est bidder for cash, for the purpose of making partition among the ten ants in common, the' following de scribed pieces or parcels of land, ly ing and being in Blue Ridge Town ship, Henderson County,, North Caro lina, bounded and more particularly described as follows, to-wit: ; Hist Tract: All those 82 acres in Henderson County aforesaid part of J stent 250, on the waters of Tumble lug Creek,: and being the land con veyed by deed from . Wm. Redmond, Jr.; et al to P. J. -Brock, said deed being dated April 1, 1875 and record ed in. Book 30 at page 433 of the records of deeds for Henderson County, which land is described by metes and bounds as follows: Begin ning on a dogwood, Hicks' N. W. cor ner, and runs west 63 poles to a chestnut oak, Brock and Jones cor ner; then south 60 degrees west 113 rles to a hickory stump, originally M. Justice's corner; thence south o2 degrees east 158 poles passing corner, and Justice's bluckgum corner, to a Spanish oak in the old Hicks, now R. Fortune line; then north 98 poles with a marked line to a chestnut; then with a marked line north 8 degrees east to the begin ning. Containing 82 acres. Except ing, however, from this boundary, 25 acres sold and conveyed by P. J. Brock and wife M. A. Brock, to J. B. Phillips, by deed recorded in Book 43 at page 382 of the records of deeds for Henderson County, North 'Caro lina. . , -l 2nd Tract: All that tract of land described in a deed from J. H. Jus tice to P. J. Brock, dated 11th day of March 1874 and and recorded in Book 75 at page 141 of the records of deeds for Henderson County; said land lying and being in the county No time is lost TELEPHONE US eaves a prescription or when an accident occurs. do is call us and our messenger will be right over with what you need. Both Phones 403 HAVE YOU Hunter's EVERYTHING IN DRUGS ELECTRIC LINE CORNER HENDERSONVILLE, N. C. O ; S Bank with n . 1 III Jt ' 2H SET2', U SJSg- W . - 3a MEMBER FEDMl RESERVE SYSTEM OF BANKS Just because ours is a NATIONAL bank is no reason why we cannot make you " feel at home " 'when you come in. Try it. We are happy over being a Member Bank of the FEDERAL RESERVE System of banks. We can take our securities to our Central Re serve Bank when we want to and get money, So can you come to us when YOU want to and get YOUR money. PUT YOUR MONEY IN OUR BANK. CM .r-; ; f? aforesaid bounded as follows: viz Beginning on a stone in J. J. Justice's corner; thence west with a condition al line to a hickory, Justice's corner; then, with Justice's line to a black oak and pine; then west with a con ditional marked ' line to Monroe Brock's line; then northeast to a stone on or near the top of the ridge; thence with P. J. Brock's line to the beginning. Containing 8 acresmore or less, lying on the waters of Tum ble Bug Creek. 3rd Tract: Joining the lands of John H. Justice and others. Begin-' ning at a stone on , the north side of the road and bears south 85 degrees east 12 8-11 poles to a stone in the original line; thence with the same north 6 degrees east 12 8-11 poles to a stone and pointers; thence north 85 degrees west 12 8-11 poles to a stone and pointers; thence south 5 degrees west 12 8-11 poles to the beginning. Containing one acre, more or less. Said land will be offered for sale in separate tracts and then as a whole, and the manner, of sale in which it brings the most money it will be sold by. This January 27, 1919. ' W. C. RECTOR Commissioner. The Telephone puts our Store right at your elbow when the doctor All you have to TRIED US? Pharmacy a
The Times-News (Hendersonville, N.C.)
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