OCR Text |
Show WAGE INCREASE WOULD SOAR PRICES, REPORT The statement by unidentified "Administration economists" i that manufacturers' profits after taxes tax-es in 1946 will be $6.3 billion and that wages could be increased 24 per cent without reducing profits or increasing prices, is "the most cockeyed business forecast ever made by presumably responsible persons". , Making this assertion, Walter B. Weisenburger, executive vice-president vice-president of . the National Assn. of Manufacturers,' recalled that President Truman recently "repudiated "re-pudiated one of his administrators administra-tors for irresponsible statements about wages and prices," and declared de-clared : "The . President would be well advised to take equally drastic action in connection with those guilty of this latest nonsense." Report "Confidential" . . . Efforts to get a copy of the statement or of the calculations on which it is based have been met with the answer that "the report re-port is confidential and no copies are available," the NAM spokesman spokes-man said, adding: Business hopes that next year it will make good profits the more the better, because the record rec-ord shows that the higher the profits the more jobs there are and te greater overall prosperity. "But it takes real profits' to bring about this result, not such 'iffy' guess-work paper profits as coconcted by those afraid to let anyone else see their figures granting they have any supporting support-ing figures." This "new dream from Washington" Wash-ington" could be realiged only by letting prices skyrocket at the expense of the consumer and that would mean inflation, Mr. Weisenburger Weis-enburger concluded. |