Show hl 1 ato t L alib nal aai lei CZ C 1 ebli EB Pi W 91 ir washington it is only a few short w weeks until the S seventy v enty afif fifth th congress colv convenes enes work for and so naturally congress congress t the h e prelim preliminary i nary grinding of legislative wheels is now being heard of course there has been no legislative program formulated little of a specific character can be done in this direction until the fog and the smoke of a campaign drifts away nevertheless beneath it all there are definite signs to guide us to show some of the important questions that will naturally force their wa way y to the front rank of consideration by congress as soon as it is formally organized january 3 while I 1 do not take much stock in many of the ideas or schemes that are receiving consideration or to which sponsors are trying to direct attention it is perfectly evident that one of the major questions to receive congressional attention this year is the pl plight ight of business busine Ss I 1 mean that there are countless governmental ern mental policies that directly affect business and the debate of the recent presidential campaign h has as awakened such widespread interest in general business that congress congles 5 cannot avoid debate on the subject there are many members of the house and senate including a goodly number of those thos lately elected or reelected re elected who feel that the washington government has been messing too much into the aff affairs airs of private business they feel and I 1 believe with justification that unless many of the government handicaps are withdrawn unless many of the restrictions and the superfluous rules and regulations are removed business cannot go ahead as it apparently would like to do it is said that many corporations would like to engage in plant expansion and increase their pay rolls by many thousands of workers but they are afraid to do so under present laws and policies they cannot i feel a sense of safety and corporate funds after all are just like many belonging to an individual those who manage it or own it will not invest it unless they can be assured of policies by the government at washington that give them an equal chance at least to obtain a return on the money they invest in other words corporations are just like individuals who will not risk their money unless they have confidence that the odds are favorable to them I 1 word came to me the other day through official channels to the effect that a gigantic and well known corporation was ready to expand its whole productive capacity if it could be bea certain that federal tax laws were going to be revised so that they consisted of tax laws rather than tax penalties on business chances the word was that this i corporation expected to spend about one hundred forty two millions that the authorization for the work had been approved by the corporations board of directors and that blue prints of the plans had been drawn but all of this had been done upon n a contingent basis I 1 you will say that this is an iso soi i case and it is but it is isolated only to the extent that I 1 am not able to name names and identify directly hundreds of other corporations that are exactly in the same i i boat to an extent information that other corporations are following the I 1 same policy is hearsay yet I 1 have every faith in the reports concern ing general plans along these lines and I 1 am firmly convinced of the sincerity of business ma managements n agamen ts generally to go ahead if the washington government permits them to have confidence that they will not i be destroyed by taxation later I 1 it seems to me there are three phases of federal government poll poli cies and laws that spending p 8 serve to retard policies business recovery I 1 mentioned mention ad taxation and government regulation or bureaucracy there is a third thi rd 1 it t 1 is s the spending policies that have been followed and that have resulted in the enormous federal debt with a budget still unbalanced I 1 do not know which of the three Is held to be the most important among business generally regimentation and bureaucracy breed a fear in in the minds of so many business leaders that as long as bureaucracy in washington continues to be as widespread as it is this of the segment business structure is going goine to remain quiescent another will do nothing in segment waff the wa Y of expanding operations when the tax laws s are ar taking such a tremendous tou toll and actually serve as an impelling in force against the desires or of business to increase ease its own revenue ue the third factor of influence that of govern government men t spending t throws ahro WS a fear into the hearts of every lusi business man As 10 long ng as the budget is unbalanced alced ind and din spending spen 9 even wasting of money continues there S ls is an P unsettling influence at work which sta keeps busi n ess interests from m making new pa plans ans the reason is that an unbalanced budget and wasteful expenditures cons constitute a continual threat of inflation especially is this true when the chief ex executive has the power to change the value of money the busness men as far as my information goes take the position that it is wo worse arse than useless tor for them to attempt to increase their production or mold plans regarding their business as long as they cannot feel sure that the value of the money they use will be the same tomorrow that it is today frequently I 1 have heard evidence substantiating vitiating litia ting the observations I 1 have made above these business interests provide the outlet for tremendous amounts of money now lying idle in banks in other words these business interests are the potential borrowers of billions of dollars that are not now being used and the fact that they are not borrowing this money simply cuts off the use of a very important force in our economic life further the fact that business is not borrowing money and engaging in in expansion expansion n of production has the very vital result of preventing employment of labor the american federation of labor announces that there are something like eleven MR millions of workers still unemployed yet the question must be asked how or why business would want wan t to do a better job in behalf of itself and help labor by employing additional workers at the same time when its own government continually harasses it in one way or another no amount of criticism by those responsible in the government can force business to take a chance with its money it must have a reasonable guarantee that its government will allow it to have at least a reasonable profit or else the money will continue to remain idle 0 0 undoubtedly we will see a very great many bills popping around the capitol bills de expect signed to relieve many bills business of this or the other handicap now believed to be hanging over it the bulk of them will receive no consideration because the bulk of those bills will be loosely drawn and will be representative only of the desires of a particular segment of commerce or industry but as the situation now appears we can expect to see something done about the tax laws in the forthcoming congress it appears fairly certain to me for example that the ridiculous surplus earnings tax enacted by the last congress must be mw rewritten ritten because the bulk of our business is handled by corporations it ought to be important to give corporations consideration as a class they had specific attention from the new dealers and this despised corporation tax on surplus earnings was the vehicle upon which many of the nitwits among the new dealers attempted to ride business generally speaking opposed enactment of the statute but business was not able to o overcome the roosevelt control 0 I 1 in congress hence the tax law was enacted and corporations are paying the penalty but it might be asked whether anything better can be expected in this session of congress the answer is that there are more members of the house and senate now who recognize 01 n ize that the competitive system of doing business always in operation in the united states heretofore should not be destroyed it can be expected therefore that something will be done about that tax law and just as certainly something will be done in a legislative way about the numerous rules and regulations that constantly interfere with the free transaction of business these rules and regulations of course were drafted under authority given by congress but my conversations among house and senate leaders convince me that these men see the error of their previous enactments they are willing to be somewhat more mom bold coming as they do fresh from the elections and they are rather likely to insist upon legislation which will 11 help he p rather than hinder it may be of course that organized labor will be powerful enough to force consideration of legislation shortening all hours of labor I 1 do not know how it cabbe can be done because there is every evidence that such legislation would be unconstitutional it probably Y can be done by the state legiel legislative active bodies but not by the tha federal governa government ent while as I 1 said organized labor may force forc e consideration of this sort of i thing 1 there ere is li attle atle doubt in i my mind that congress will stand out against enactments of this type first because 8 0 of the of r apparent rent lack constitutional support and ands ond because sec it would further K harassment rrb of business constitute Ss dur a 8 ing ng a period when ev everyone elyone who is sane wants to see bus iness slants again ge get going 0 western newspaper union |