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Show 1ST LOIR COSTS, MIKE OPERATORS SAY ' Utah Metal Men Declare Shut Down to Be the Only Alternative. Investigating Committee Writes to Merchants Asking Ask-ing Co-operation. Culcss there, is aa immediate reduction reduc-tion of about 20 per cent in the cost, of necessaries of life, all tha mines and smelters of Utah will close. Such is tbe declaration in a. circular issued by the metal mine operators of Utah to merchauts in the mining camps. The statement is based on findings of a committer; recently appointed by the operators to iuquire into the cost of supplies and living expenses in the metal producing communities. It is pointed out in the circular that while the price of copper since the armistice has declined from 26 cents a pound to 15 cents, and that of lead from $8.05 a hundred to $5.25, thus necessitating ne-cessitating reduction in the. -wages of employees aud in the profits of the operators, the prices on supplies and necessaries of life have remained as high as they were last July. Condition Fatal, Claim. This condition, it is contended, is fatal fa-tal to the 'mining industry, and the committee purposes to loam why it ' exists. Ii it is discovered that those who are furnishing the commodities are making no effort to reduce the costs, the mine operators will act in the matter for themselves, the circular circu-lar states, for they do not propose to allow their business to be crippled and thus entail the losses that would result to themselves and their employes. According to the committee; the circular cir-cular is not. sent in the spirit of antagonism, an-tagonism, but as an invitation to the merchauts concerned to help in the 1 solution of a problem of vital impor- i tauce to themselves. Merchants' Aid Asked. Data is being collected from every available source, and the .merchants are requested to furnish certain information in-formation necessary to the determination determina-tion of just where the blame for the high prices lies. The committee which is making the investigation includes: - Imer Pett, general manager of Bingham Bing-ham Mines company and Eagle & Blue ' ."'tell Mining company, chairman; C. U. Allen, manager of mines, U. S. Smelting, Smelt-ing, Refining & Mining company,, vice 1 chairman: 1-red Cowans, general m,an-; m,an-; ager Utah Consolidated. Mining corn-j corn-j pany; C. F. Jennings, assistant pur-( pur-( . chasing agent, Utah Copper company; i i J. Westcott, secretary Silver King j Coalition Mines company; J. B. White-I White-I hill, ore purchasing agent, International Smelting company.' |