THE MATCH MONOPOLY IN AMERICA.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 6, Issue 1685, 14 May 1884, Page 3

THE MATCH MONOPOLY IN AMERICA.

" That you are lighting your cigar with is a very small thing, isn't it? said a passenger who had shared my ,; scat for a few miles. " A small thing, -!.-but,you-wouldn't boliovo the Americans .paid out dols. for matches Inst year, would you? It looks big, but it is a fact. Now,tako a pencil and figure it out, Fifty millions of people in this country; they'use on an average iivo matches each per day; that is 250,000,000 matches daily,' or 2,500,000 boxes of 100 matches in a box each day. Last year these boxes retailed at an iiverago of three cents each, making'7s,ooo: dols. a day for matches, or 27,375,000 dols a year. And then to think that three-fourths of all theso matches are supplied by one company! If they didn't make 8,000,000 dols -a day out of it they didn't make a cent." The harvest day of tho match monopoly is now at an cud, as they no longer have a Government revenue.-tax levied for their j benefit- But they still control the trade on account of their superior manufacturing facilities, large capital, &c.,. They own thousands of acres of timber land in Michigan, and their lumber is cut up by their own men and shipped on their own boats. And then they have contracted for nearly all tho world's supply of phosphorous years ahead, and tho manufacturers starting into the business find themselves overmatched in .many ways by the old monopoly, which can still control the trade and make fair profit on their investments. They control twenty two factories, and one of them has a capital of 72,000,000 matches daily."