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Show Page Ten The National Enterprise, April 28, 1976 Economic Myths and Public Opinion continued from page Three from Germany, from Italy. Wherever you name it, it was the poor and the miserable who flocked here and they found here a home and the opportunity to improve their lot. And they found it not despite rugged individualism but because of rugged individualism that induced the developments in industry, in trade, that offered opportunities for people. Of course, our condition is far better than theirs. In an absolute sense their level of living was low. But we must compare their level of living not to ours but to the level of living they left in Europe. We stand on their shoulders. We are able to live as well as we do because of their achieve- say, it seems to me disgraceful for so many people to denigrate the experience of their parents, when that experience has made it possible for them to live in a free society at their present high level. So much for economic development. What about the other charges? What about the charge that the agriculments and their accomplishments, because of what hap- tural community was being pened during that period of ground down, that it was the nineteenth century. I must being exploited by the Wall Security Brokers, Dealers, Corporate Officials, Attorneys. hand for sweaty, palms A helping . Juristics Securities Law Seminars help you avoid problems under securities regulations. Theyre education on tape to protect you and your clients. Complete, current, concise seminars covering the field of Securities Law, you learn at your leisure from experts. Listen and learn while you commute to the office, while you have lunch, in the evenings as you relax at home. 12 Cassette Seminars in handsome album with compendium Street bankers? That we Cruelty to Animals, and the needed to have a greenback movement and a Populist movement and a William Jennings Bryan? , Once again, the evidence against that is very simple and very clear. In the first place, if agriculture was being especially exploited, you would expect the number of people on farms to go down, but the number of people on farms rose by leaps and bounds during the period. If agriculture was in a bad state and being exploited, you would expect the price of farm land to go down, but the price of fajrm land went up rapidly. Certainly, the prices of farm products did go down. But they went down because the great fertile areas of the Middle West were being opened up and brought into production. Output was growing rapidly, the cost of producing farm crops was going down thanks to great technological innovation in the form of reapers and other agricultural machinery, and the cost of transportation was falling. The result was a great outpouring of production which produced a decline in the prices of farm products at the same time that it produced a very rapid rise in the incomes of farmers and induced many people to enter farming. On a very different aspect of this experience, was it a period of heartless monopoly capitalism? Quite the contrary it was the period of the greatest private eleemosynary activity in the history of the United States. The period of unrestrained rugged individualism was a period when the modern type of nonprofit community hospital was first established and developed. It was the period of the Carnegie Libraries and their spread through the philanthropy of Andrew Carnegie. It was the period when so many colleges were founded throughout the country. It was the period of the of the founding of the spread of foreign missions. There was no income tax, no deductibility of contributions, so what people spent on charity came out of their pocket and not, as now, largely out of taxes they would otherwise pay. And yet-- or should I say because-- in every aspect of private charitable eleemosynary activity, it was a bloom period. So, I believe that the generally accepted historical picture of the nineteenth century is an extraordinary myth. Years ago I wrote a book with a collaborator on the monetary history of the United States, and in the course of writing it, I read a great many of the general histories of the nineteenth century. As an economist, I was simply appalled by the level of ignorance of economic matters that was displayed in those history books, by the extent to which the historians were willing to take the cries and the claims of reformers and political agitators for reality. Everybody, of course, always wants to improve his lot. Everybody would like to see the price of the things he sells go up, and the price of things he buys go down. But since what one man sells another man buys, thats hardly a feasible situation. We find the same inconsistency today when people talk about inflation. What people mean by inflation is not the rise in their own wages but the rise in the prices other people are charging them. And that was the case in the nineteenth century. The people who were in the Greenback and the Populist movement were We want to do still but the historians better, tended to take their exaggerated objections for reality. saying, Thats Myth Number One, Mr, Friedman will challenge other economic myths in the concluding article next week. Society for Prevention of ' the small investment of only $1 00.00. Any one of the 1 2 sessions could save you many times its modest cost. All for JURISTICS Send for your Juristics Securities Law Seminars now. Juristics, Inc. 233 Parker, Suite 101 P.O.Box 11126 San Francisco, California more than tripled to DALLAS, Texas-U- TL has from the $4,030,308 Corp. (OTC 4.875, 5.25) announced significant gains in $1,248,167 reported a year were revenues and earnings for earlier. Earnings both the third quarter and the $239,666, or 14 cents a share, s nine months ended March 31, including carryforof ward benefits $105,766, or 6 1976. Revenues for the nine cents per share. In the same months more than doubled to quarter a year ago, earnings from the were $12,826, or 1 cent per $7,547,974 s $3,392,267 reported in the share, including a benefit of comparable period a year ago. carryforward h earnings were $5,070. 27 cents per Dr. C.C. Lee, president, or $448,179, share, compared to $82,670, said that net income for the or 5 cents per share, in the balance of fiscal 1976 is expecyear-earliperiod. The earn- ted to increase as a result of ings figures include tax credits the companys larger backlog, s which was approximately $12 attributable to carryforwards of $201,681 or 12 million as of March 31, 1976, cents per share in the 1976 compared to approximately period and $33,182 or 2 cents $1.8 million at the same time a per share, in the 1975 period. year earlier. tax-los- 941 01 Please send me the Juristics 1 2 Cassette Seminar on Securities Law. My check for $1 00.00 is enclosed. tax-los- Nine-mont- Name Street Address state City Charge my UTL Notes Earnings Bankamericard Zip Master Charge er tax-los- Account Number Signature Expiration Date ! Third-quart- er revenues |