"PROFITEERING"

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 17, 15 October 1919, Page 3

"PROFITEERING"

WHAT IT EXACTLY' MEANS PRESENT DAY POSITION DISSECTED The attitude of the American labour unions, of tne United States Administration, and of Congress toward* Uio question of living costs and "profiteering", has ra:sed several questions in tins centre of mercantile distribution (says tho Chicago ooiTi'snowlent of the New York "Evening Post''). Does "profiteering" oxist on an extensivft scale? If it exists, then can it tie stopped? All this depends somewhat on just what you mean by "profiteering," A'ssunnng that it means tho getting of all the profit obtainable in a given industry, then Chicago's verdict would be that there is profiteering everywhere. If thero is any lino of business in which thero is not that kind of profiteering, it would be difficult to find it. Everyone in business is at present apparently occupying himself to muko as much as possible in the shortest possible time. That they aro able to do so is a psychological matter. in the past iivo years tho public bicamo so accustomed to continually rising prices as finally to accept tiiem as a matter of coui'be. At first it was the war which led to their, acceptance as inevitable; now that tho war is over, the catchword of "inflation" serves the purpose. But even that does not tell the wholo story. It is the familiar cost of high living which is abroad throughout tho land and is largely responsible lor the high prices. People had already got in tho way of living more expensively. Labour itself wishes to have more than ever before, and to havo what it gels of a higher grade. One might havo imagined that high prices would have made tho whole community anxious to investigate prices in olio place or another, and to seek for the lowest. But not at all. Every merchant knows that where ordinary buyers before the war would object to higher prices, and refuse to purehaso if the goods were placed at a figure which they deemed unreason, able, now it is their custom to pay the price without question. All retailers wport that the demand is best for the better grades of goods. Men who work in factories and do rough work are buying silk shirts and silk underwear. Their wives ara wearing expensive hosiery. You meet negroes on the street cars who brag about their silk stockings. Those military men whohave been in the negro district to suppress riots hero in tho last few weeks are amazed at the clothes th#' negro men and women wore; some of them being outright fashion plates. Mote automobiles aro owned by working classes than ever before. Even Chicago barbers aro riding in Packard cars. The perfectly natural- result was for murchants, restaurants, and landlords to put up prices as much as they thought buyers would stand.

If oho lrnnts tho frank Chicago opinion, it is that the time has come for caling a halt in tho riso in values, It is truo that the cost of production has increased; but profits have increased lu a greater extent than thit of production. The common answer heretofore has been that with rising wages and decreased production there is nothing elsu to be expected but high priceß. Even now it is difficult to find a merchant who expects a slump in dry goods, clothing- and slides, even with the "antiprofiteering" crusade, they say it is the pnblic itself which is intoxicated with extravagance.

But at the same time, one may easily VSlieover that! the cost, especially of things to eat, is 50 to 100 per cent, higher in districts inhabited by people who are trying to lead a ' 10,000 dollar V year oxistonce on a 3000 dollar salary than in sections whero the more prudent middle classes reside. In the latUr section better goods for half the price are sometimes obtainable. This lias its bearing on the question whether averago profits aro or are not larger than they should bo.