24 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



July 



News from the National Capital 



Furnishing information rogarding the costs of production and 

 distribution liy an association of manufacturers to its members is 

 open to question because of its tendency to induce those who use 

 it to disregard their actual and individual costs and to adopt a 

 standard or average which does not relate to their business, as well 

 as to add to the margin on this uniform basis, Nelson B. Gaskill, 

 Acting Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, declared on 

 July 16. 



The statement was made in reply to a letter of inquiry addressed 

 to the Commission by E. J. Moss, of the American Sash and Door 

 Company, of Kansas City, in which it was stated that he jjro- 

 posed to incorporate the Mill Work Cost Bureau, formed of a 

 group of planing mill houses which submit to a central agency their 

 actual costs on completed products, from which average or stand- 

 ard costs are computed. Among other purposes under the pro- 

 posed charter, the Bureau would furnish from time to time informa- 

 tion to its members relating to the manufacturing and distributing 

 costs of various kinds of mill work and to supply its members with 

 suitable schedules or lists of mill work, from time to time, showing 

 the cost thereof, based on tests made in the factories of its 

 members. 



The result of the issuance of these lists, said Commissioner Gas- 

 kill, "is a trend towards uniformity of selling price and the lessen- 

 ing of competitive sales on the basis of efficiency. The effect 

 might be — in the absence of an ability to forecast consequences, 

 we cannot say it will be — to characterize the Bureau as a combina- 

 tion to lessen competition and to restrain trade, even to create 

 monopoly. 



One of the most valuable functions of a trade association is eilucntion 

 in proper methods of cost accounting, so that the member nia.v know as 

 accurately as possible and compete with knoNvledge of his own business. 

 He must make Its own prices. And any concerted effort to substitute 

 for the individual's actual cost, what may be to him a highly arbitrary and 

 uniform cost basis, seems to be a dangerous misuse of the Bureau's 

 processes. It takes away the necessity for individual costs accounting by 

 creating an arbitrary cost standard. 



It deprives the efficient of the competitive advantage which efficienc.v 

 gives and tends to raise the selling price to the consumer. Furthermore, 

 the pressure toward the arbitrary use of standard costs disregards the 

 fact that these costs vary continuously not onl.v with the several mills, 

 but with the whole industry, and that those changes can not be reflected 

 to the consumer under the uniform cost list as promptly as by the indi- 

 vidual producers each working from his own mill. 



The Commission has no legal power to approve or disapprove your 

 project at this stage. Its opinion in the matter may be apparent. Only 

 this is sure: If you do not publish a uniform cost list nor endeavor to 

 educate your member.ship to the use of standard cost, you will, so far as 

 this is concerned, be within the law. 



******** *» 



Members of the American. Forestry Association who have charged 

 that the organization is managed under undemocratic methods will 

 have a hearing on their allegations in the near future in Washing- 

 ton or in New York City, it has been stated by officials of the 

 organization here. Although no date has yet been set, it is under- 



stood that tlie hearing will probably be held in September or 

 OctoliiT. 



Outlining the protests of those who seek reform in the associa- 

 tion, a statement signed by the foresters says that they "recognize 

 with profound regret that the association has adopted a course 

 which, unless promi)tly corrected, forfeits its rights to the confi- 

 dence of the public and clearly invalidates its claim to represent 

 the forest interests of the people." 



The protests declare that by amendment to the by-laws adopted 

 at the last annual meeting in Washington in February, 1921, the 

 control of the association was taken out of the hands of its mem- 

 bers and given over to a "self -perpetuating board with unusual 

 powers." Also, that the "financial management of the associa- 

 tion is not sound," and that the association has "confined itself 

 too exclusively to the work of general publicity and failed to take 

 a leadership in many of the vital issues involving State and Fed- 

 eral legislation, especially where controversies are involved." 



The protests are signed by more than 100 prominent foresters. 

 Many are officers of State forestry associations or State forestry 

 officers. Others are directors or professors in schools for forestry, 

 and scores are in the forest services of the States, the Federal Gov- 

 ernment and Canada. Gifford Pinchot is a signer, as is W. B. 

 Greeley, Chief Forester, and Henry S. Graves, ex-Chief Forester. 

 #*******•* 



A new forest experiment station, the first in the Eastern States, 

 will be established at Asheville, N. C, within a short time by the 

 Forest Service of the Department of Agriculture, it was announced 

 here this week. Steady depletion of the Southern Appalachian 

 timber supply has been responsible for the location of this station 

 in the East, and the subject of the work to be conducted will be to 

 secure information needed by foresters for the best methods of 

 handling forest lands in the southern mountains. . 



For many years the United States has depended for a large part 

 of its hardwood timber products on North Carolina, Virginia, West 

 Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia and South Caro- 

 lina, the Forest Service declares. The crest of hardwood produc- 

 tion in this region, with a cut of approximately four billion feet, 

 was reached in 1909. By 1918 the production had fallen off nearly 

 60 per cent, in the face of rising lumber prices and increasing 

 demands. 



' ' There is every reason to expect the same trend to continue, 

 owing to the steady decrease in timber supplies," the Bureau 

 states. Continuing the statement says: 



"The country as a whole will, in the future, have to depend on 

 the steep mountain slopes of the Southern Appalachians for a very 

 large percentage of its high grade hardwood supplies. The bulk 

 of the remaining hardwood stands is now in the Lower Mississippi 

 Valley, and it is practically certain that a large part of this rich 

 bottom land will be used for agricultural purposes when the timber 

 is removed. The entire country should therefore be directly inter- 

 ested in bringing about the growing of hardwood timber in this 

 region where ideal conditions exist for its production. 



Northern Manufacturers Endorse Practicable Forestry 



AT THEIR meeting at the South Shore Country Club, Friday, 

 July 22, as guests of Edward Hines of Chicago, members of 

 the Northern Hemlock and Hardwood Manufacturers' Associa- 

 tion put themselves on record through resolution as being favorable 

 to the application of forestry principles wherever it ,is demon- 

 strated that that application may be economically and financially 

 jjossible. 



The association addressed its thought to the forestry committee 



of the Chamber of Commerce of the United States in a letter 

 prepared and passed as a resolution, in which the lumbermen rec- 

 ognized it as their duty to cut wisely and with the greatest care 

 for the future supply and with full utilization of the present 

 product'. The letter was opposed to slash burning and regulation 

 of tree cutting. It further stated that even thougli present taxes 

 are practically confiscatory and though the timber owners are 



(Continued on poge 26) 



