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Show DEVOURING OUR INCOME "Rampant inflation is as dan-erous dan-erous to our nation-as the threat of Russia. It eats up personal savings, shrinks incomes, undermines under-mines financial institutions, and breeds financial immorality." That is the view of J. Russell Duncan, president of Minneapolis-Moline Minneapolis-Moline Company. He adds: "Our gross national income, an estimated esti-mated $480 billion this year, is being devoured by an omnivorous government, extravagant business practices; and a luxury-loving domestic economy." Mr. Duncan goes into some of the specifics of the matter. In the case of business, he finds, many executives grew. up in an extremely favorable economic climate. cli-mate. They often tend to favor practices which add unnecessarily to overhead. Plants are loaded with high-priced frills. He cites the case of his own company where, due to a rigorous reduction in needless overhead, more business is being done with 25 per cent fewer employes. Without this surgery, he goes on, all of the company's employes would have been out of work. Labor, must bear, its share of the blame for inflation--and "it's a big share. When payroll costs increase beyond increases in productivity, prices can go nowhere no-where save up. Last, but certainly not least, Mr. Duncan deals with government spending. He says: "For every instance of excess overhead in business that we have mentioned, you can multiply it a thousand fold when talking about excess overhead in government." Here is the most fruitful of all areas or economies and reforms that will protect what is left of the American dollars' shrunken worth. |