Page:Earle, Does Price Fixing Destroy Liberty, 1920, 095.jpg

Rh of a commodity can be increased, without increase of cost to the consumer, to 10,000 barrels a day, it is of enormous advantage to the public whether there be an immediate decrease in price or not. The stimulus, therefore, that should be given, for such increase of production must not only reduce scarcity, but must increase competition, and ultimately reduce prices. To say, therefore, that the seeking of this legitimate and highly beneficial reward, even for the short time it can be enjoyed, is to imperil a man in all the dangers of criminal prosecution, is to say that which is economically unsound. An exceedingly interesting discussion of this matter by Mr. Carl Snyder is to be found in the March-April 1920 Number of McClure's Magazine. He says, in part: "There has been one Bureau at Washington whose aggregate expenses now run beyond a million dollars, that has seemed to make its especial business distilling into the public mind every kind of vicious idea about business. * * *  It has sent out report after report showing the enormous profits of this or that company or trade.  But what kind of profit?  Always the profits on the invested capital!  Rarely, if ever, have these profits been figured on gross sales.  Why?  Because, however large the profits cited have been, on the invested capital, the average profits on sales have been something on the order that I have given above, usually less than five or six per cent., often half this, and in the case of the criminal band of meat packers, known as the 'Big Five,' they have often been below two per cent.  And this brings us to the very heart of the question of 'profiteering.'  I make bold to say that the public has relatively little interest in the earnings upon