Toledo Union Journal

Prices and Wages

Settlement of the steelworkers strike by the expedient of granting a substantial price increase to the steel corporations proves that the strike was a good thing—for the steel companies.

Wage increases granted to the steelworkers and other unions cannot be evaluated except in the light of the workers' experience in the next few months based upon the volume of goods their wages will purchase. On the other hand, the corporations will be able to get an accurate estimate of their profits through their accounting systems.

If the wage increases simply mean that the workers will be handling larger sums of money without substantial increase in the volume of goods which they will be able to purchase, the current wage increases will mean little or nothing to them and will not contribute to a stable economy.

If the price increases enable the corporations to not only compensate themselves for the wage increases which are being granted at this time, but to continue piling up large profits, ultimate surpluses leading to economic stagnation will eventuate.

Wage and price increases granted simultaneously cannot solve the problem of maintaining a healthy economy in the face of the refusal of the corporations to open their books to scrutiny on the grounds that the books are the sole prerogative of management.

We cannot secure and maintain the proper balance between production and distribution without knowing all the factors which play their part in the complete industrial business picture.

The stage is all set and the signal about to be given for one of the greatest peacetime production drives this nation has ever experienced. The tools are ready, the market exists, labor is ready. But the drive can be the great push which may again send us down into an economic tailspin which we can ill afford to chance.

Unless the workers who are also the consumers are able to purchase in sufficiently large enough volume to prevent a surplus of commodities from glutting the market, the rapidly approaching full scale production will be but a temporary boom and we shall be hastening the day of economic reckoning

As matters now stand, wages and prices seem to be on a trial and error basis with nearly everyone confused, except in the certainty that imbalance between the two factors will surely hurl us into the abyss of another depression.