388 LIVE-STOCK AND MEAT INDUSTRY 



West, particularly Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and North Dakota. 

 The record of these attempts is not an encouraging one. The 

 death-rate has been very high among them. Apparently they are 

 too small to conduct a large-scale business which meat packing is, 

 par excellence; they can buy live stock and kill it and prepare good 

 meat ; they are weak in marketing their product, because they can 

 not furnish at any and all times the quality and the quantity of 

 meat the buyer wants. This is because their supply of live stock 

 is not constant and regular in quantity, quality, or time. 



(2) Municipal Abattoirs. Largely as a sanitary measure, 

 American cities are beginning to erect and operate municipal 

 abattoirs, and as experience accumulates, and as public health 

 becomes more the concern of every taxpayer, there is certain to 

 come an increase in the number of these slaughter houses. The 

 unspeakable filth which surrounds many (probably most) small 

 butchers' private slaughter houses, near the villages and cities, 

 is certainly a condition to challenge the attention of public health 

 officers. In time the municipal abattoir will doubtless be a very 

 important economic factor in the fresh meat business. The posi- 

 tion of the large packers in the cured meats, however, seems to be 

 safe from any local competition of this kind. 



QUESTIONS ON THE TEXT 



1. How does the packing industry rank in importance among American 



industries? 



2. Show that this industry is of more than national importance. 



3. Describe the course of live stock production in the United States. Signifi- 



cance of movement. 



4. What economic and legal questions are involved in the study of meat 



packing? 



5. Discuss the live stock situation under these topics: meat as food; geo- 



graphical shift; change in number of live stock; future outlook for an 

 increase and for a decrease; summarize. 



6. State outlook for foreign competition. 



7. Discuss the meat packing industry of the United States under following 



topics: large-scale business; division of labor; by-products; distribution; 

 inspection. 



8. Show American attitude toward monopoly, political or economic. 



9. Give the findings of the Garfield Report. 



10. Quote the President's letter of 1917 directing an investigation by the 



Federal Trade Commission. 



11. Give findings of the Federal Trade Commission. 



12. What remedies did the Trade Commission propose? 



13. Give reply of the packers. 



14. What is the real evil? The fitting remedy? 



15. Discuss advisability of government ownership of the meat packing 



industry. 



16. Give status of cooperative packing house movement. 



17. Give situation as regards municipal abattoirs. 



