THE GOOD AND THE BAD OF TRUSTS 143 



escaped consolidation. Finally, the losses that competition 

 often entails, which have been made worse by unwise laws, 

 have furnished a pretext of no little plausibility for attempts 

 to form monopolies. It is at this point that the arguments 

 in favor of trusts possess most weight. 



Yet, with all the strength that the movement towards 

 combination has acquired, competition has always vexed 

 the would be monopolist, and is especially active at the 

 present moment. As this is written, one trust is already 

 confronted by fourteen independent companies, while an- 

 other rival enterprise with a capital of $1,000,000 is in process 

 of formation. Another combination owning 290 mills was, 

 in October, confronted by independent companies operating 

 seventy four mills ; and in December a new concern with a 

 capital of $5,000,000 was formed. Almost every day brings 

 word of the appearance of new competitors for various trusts, 

 and that the revival of competition may be considered a 

 general movement. Some of the independent enterprises 

 may have been started with the purpose of selling out to the 

 trusts; but, if combinations have the superior efficiency that 

 is claimed for them, they are under no obligation to purchase, 

 and the investors in rival concerns would be taking incon- 

 ceivable risks if competition were really useless. Trusts pur- 

 chase rival concerns because competition from such com- 

 panies is dangerous, and not hopeless; and the revival of 

 independent enterprise is a reason for believing that the 

 business world has not accepted the theory that a combina- 

 tion possesses material advantages over separate companies 

 of a large size. Experience may yet demonstrate that the 

 attempt to " regulate" industry by consolidated enterprise 

 is the surest method of producing over investment and de- 

 pression. 



If one concedes that competition is attended with real 

 evils, he is admitting nothing that economists have not 

 known for a long time; and, if it is denied that combination 

 is a good, or even possible, remedy for the ills from which we 

 occasionally suffer, all hope of escape does not disappear. 

 The growth of fixed capital has undoubtedly introduced into 

 industry a disturbing element, productive sometimes of flue- 



