Page:A hundred years hence - the expectations of an optimist (IA hundredyearshenc00russrich).pdf/100

 Consequently, except for a few highly perishable commodities, such as milk, butter and the like, small shopkeepers in residential neighbourhoods will be driven out of business, as they are in fact already being driven out of it in the suburbs and dependencies of all large cities.

It is always possible for a large miscellaneous trader to sell at a smaller percentage of profit than a trader in a single class of merchandise: and by his bulkier purchases the former is also able to start with a lower cost price, and thus he is in every way better situated to meet the demand for cheapness. He can also meet the demand for convenience, because when he is getting almost the whole trade of a family, even at some little distance, he can afford to arrange for the transportation of goods in ways convenient to the purchaser. Thus the small shopkeeper will lose custom in every way and the large shopkeeper will gain custom. But there is still a middleman. We have not yet begun to see how he is to be eliminated, but only how he is to be limited in his numbers while being individually pampered with increased trade.

No one who observes the trend of things, however, can have failed to note how, from both sides, the middleman, quâ middleman, is liable to be squeezed out. These very large retailers tend more and more to become, little by little, manufacturers instead of merely agents