Ogden Standard-Examiner | 1920-04-25 | Page 4 | Potatoes 8 Cents, Sugar 20 Cents

L . 7. POTATOES 8 CENTS, SUGAR 20 CENTS. "i With potatoes S cents a pound and sugar more than $20 a sack ! tlhere can be no real industrial peace in the United States, j. . It is all nonsense to attribute the present unrest to the working- h men while the commercial interests boost prices to such unjustifiable r eights. l " Everyone knows that the efficiency or inefficiency of labor has I "no bearing on $160-a-ton potatoes, or $20-a-sack sugar. When the sugar was produced last fall and winter, the factories made mone3' at j thc quoted 8 or 9 cents a pound. When the potatoes were dug, the j farmer was given a big margin of profit at $2 a sack. Perhaps 90 j -per cent of the sugar and potatoes since then has passed to the hands k Hpf the middleman who has pyramided his margin of profit until the I necessities are quite beyond the ability of the average family to buy. I " y While these outrages are permitted, no semblance of a restora-p restora-p 1 tion of confidence can be established in the industrial affairs of the ' 1 workers. i , The cause is easily traced. The supply does not equal, the de- k; jnand and those who are parting with potatoes and sugar are in a W "position, to ask almost any price that greed may dictate. When a m 'situation of that kind arises, the government should step in, fix an : I' arbitrary price, and, where there is hoarding or secret bargaining. II the authorities should take possession o the goods for distribution H There must be a stop put to this unreasonable boosting of the I '.prices of the things essential to the well being of an average family.