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Show SEEN-" HEARD around the National Capital iiiEy CARTER FIELDKi i Washington. An overwhelming tier centage of the householders through out the country who have yielded to the blandishments of the government's modernization campaign have spent cash for improvements to their homes instead of borrowing. Yet it was not even contemplated that people who had the cash to spend would need the coax Ing. The chief problem the Federal Hons ing administration Is up against Is re luctance of people everywhere to go into debt. It was rather a jolt to everyone ev-eryone In the administration to dis cover this, and in fact, It requires a good deal of prying Into the situation to And that this Is the fact. But it Is the truth, nevertheless. The point seems to be that this Is the first move the administration has made in Its dealings with various sections sec-tions of the public where the idea Is to get people who still have a little property, represented in this case by their homes, to borrow money which they must pay back for nonproductive Items. The government has dealt with property prop-erty holders before. But they were farmers, and the government was offering of-fering them something in most instances in-stances for nothing, or at most for not planting crops. What the FIIA is up against Is fear on the part of these small property holders to mortgage their incomes for the next year or so. It Is this lack of confidence in the future, which Is so disturbing to the administration, that explains why this curious fact has not been revealed before. Beyond the shadow of a doubt It is not due to any lack of pressure from corporations, which have something to sell along the modernization line bathtubs, roofing, wdiat not. Nor Is there any lack in the ballyhoo the government gov-ernment has used. For instance, the President's mother in a newsreel. For instance, the public and commercially sponsored radio programs, the dodgers In the grocery baskets, the newspaper and direct mail advertising by manu facturers whose products tie in with modernization, and by others who expect ex-pect to benefit on the turnover of money mon-ey put into circulation by this plan. Training Speakers So far the greatest measure of success suc-cess has been In the small towns. Cincinnati Cin-cinnati Is one exception among the larger cities, but the smaller places seem to need more time to get organized. organ-ized. Home owners are given a check list of all items that need attention. A vital feature of every community campaign is a canvass of such Individual Individ-ual needs and Intentions. The Federal Housing administration is schooling speakers whose services soon will be available. It is also supplying movies for the visomatic portable talking machines ma-chines that may be leased from a big telegraph company. Four pictures have been prepared for exhibition for community com-munity purposes, for financial institutions, institu-tions, for local contractors and building build-ing supply dealers, and for property owners. FIIA is dealing direct with the big national companies which sell building materials and equipment all over the country. It is having conferences with their representatives here iD Washington, and also in regional meetings meet-ings and in company offices. Meetings in 32 industrial centers were held last week. Others will follow, there having hav-ing been some holding back on the part of a few which did not wish to expose their entire hands to their competitors. FHA is urging ail Industrial firms to point the way to employees and home owners generally by catching up on plant repair and maintenance. U. S. Steel has responded with an $1S,000,000 schedule, and General Electric Is following fol-lowing suit. A big department store in Wisconsin Wiscon-sin has followed through with a refurnishing re-furnishing plan which "steps right in where Uncle Sam leaves off." But the timid householders are still reluctant to borrow. Peace in NRA Ranks All Is peaceful at the moment In NRA, with Hugh Johnson out of the picture, and the new bosses functioning, function-ing, but there is' trouble In the ofiing, and not very far off at that. One of the hints is with regard to the almost complete failure of business to "spy on itself." When NRA was set up, the main object ob-ject was to prevent murderous competition, com-petition, which ground the workers down and down in the hope of their employer that he would be able to produce pro-duce cheaply enough to undersell his competitors and get a little of the rap-Idly rap-Idly evaporating business. The Intention Inten-tion was to force each employer to pay equal wages and work his help equal hours, so that whatever other chiseling chisel-ing he might do, his help would not suffer. It was widely hailed at the time as the only solution for the vicious vi-cious circle downward in which the country had gotten. For every time Chiseler A reduced bis wages so as to get some of the business, Chiseler B met the reductions, reduc-tions, while the employees of both A and B were able to buy less of other products. And as the same thing was happening in so many lines, the buying power of the country was shrinking at every tick of the clock. It was thought, when NRA was set up and the various restrictions imposed, im-posed, that if anyone among the manufacturers manu-facturers In a given industry would start chiseling, no matter how, his competitors would smell It out, and would scream to high heaven. This would bring the chiseler before the code, authority of his Industry and measures would be taken to stop it. No one seemed to doubt that the interest in-terest of self-preservation would lead to the various production lines of Industry, In-dustry, In this way, policiug themselves. them-selves. Few Complaints Hut curiously enough it has not happened. hap-pened. The total number of complaints filed about chiseling by competitors is so small as to be utterly insignificant. insigni-ficant. Now, some of the heads of NRA are wondering what will be the reaction among business men generally if NRA should do its own snooping If Its agents should walk Into plants without with-out notice and demand a look at the hooks and n look around at the plant Just like national bank examiners, only with a view not to discovering If the Institution is solvent, and Its assets 0. K., hut to finding out what working conditions are, whether profits nre too large to be in keeping with New Deal ideals, etc. There is considerable fear that this would be very much resented, so a number of discreet inquiries are being made. There Is no desire at the moment mo-ment to further heckle business. On the contrary, there Is every desire on the part of the administration to keep business in as good a humor as possible, possi-ble, certainly until after election. That is one of the things that annoyed an-noyed the President so much recently about the United States Chamber of Commerce questionnaire. He doesn't want any element fanned Into Insurrection Insurrec-tion now. This is not the right time. But how else, those with the spirit of the NRA In their minds demand, can Its policies be enforced and the desired results obtained, In view of the demonstrated demon-strated fact that business simply will not police itself? The very word "snooper" which the operatives doing this checking up would certainly be called sends cold chills down political backs. But there has been no other Intelligent solution offered to the problem. prob-lem. So look out for an important development devel-opment along this line. But not before election. Probably not until some time next spring. Start Real Revival Drastic measures are being planned to start a real business revival by the simple expedient of getting the money directly into the hands of merchants, manufacturers or other business men who are willing to spend it if they can just borrow it somewhere. Though there has been no flurry of trumpets about It, Ben Johnson, a hanker from Shreveport, La., has been placed in charge of this particular new function of the government. What started this move was the fact, laid before the RFC, that up to September Sep-tember 24, a total of only 1G5 loans had been made, for the very disappointing disappoint-ing aggregate of $12,G2S,375. It had been the plan of the administration to have at least ?300,000,000 out on such, loans by that date. It will be Mr. Johnson's function to encourage applicants for loans, who have been turned down by regional loan agencies, to appeal to Washington, Washing-ton, then to go into the loans and see if they cannot be made. Johnson himself him-self Is full of optimism. He believes that thousands of business enterprises can use more working capital to advantage, ad-vantage, since loans can be made on a long-time basis up to five years. This has been one of the sore spots in the New Deal all along. It will be recalled that, after much discussion last year between congressional leaders lead-ers and the administration, a bill was finally put through which was Intended to open the treasury door to all sorts of loans which seemed to be sound, but which for one reason or another local banks would not make. One of the needs, It was thought, was that the government would have, for a time, at least, to take over the sort of private financing which up until the passage of the securities act was made with more or less ease by private bankers for the business concerned. Of course, everyone realized that the private bankers took a pretty fat profit on the transaction. Then their expenses ex-penses were heavy. That was how so many bond salesmen made a living. Private Banking The New Deal has never been particularly par-ticularly sympathetic with private bankers. Their profits seemed to the government an undue addition to the cost of doing business. Their profits were viewed with horror. They might have continued, in spite of this, had It not been for the securities act. But with that tremendous handicap of not being able to represent to purchasers of the securities they had to sell that there would be tremendous profits, the zest with which such securities were bought in the past evaporated. All this was realized by congress, and by the treasury, so It was arranged that the government should make the loans necessary to business expansion, and at a fairly low rate of Interest. The money was appropriated, the authority au-thority was given, and shop was opened up, so to speak. But nothing, or practically prac-tically nothing, If one may speak so disrespectfully of twelve million odd dollars, has happened. So now the government has named a particular man, Ben Johnson, and given giv-en him the assignment to go out Into the byways and hedges and find the blind, the halt and the lame who need only a little government money to blossom as the rose, or at least give a good appearance of being able so to blossom. Copyright. W'NU Srvlc |