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through black markets. This added to the price administra- 

 tor's problems. How much it is impossible to say. 



There will no doubt be many who are convinced that most 

 of these and the following strictures are fundamentally 

 sound, but doubt whether the administration could be guilty 

 of so high a percentage of error. The authors contend that 

 it is high because the administration has eliminated price as 

 a guide and has substituted regimentation instead. Having 

 made that fundamental error, all others follow from it. 



The administration has accomplished certain things for 

 the war effort and civilians. These accomplishments have 

 been well presented by the administrators and the Office of 

 War Information and have received wide discussion by ra- 

 dio, the press, movies, and word of mouth. It is assumed 

 that the public is familiar with most of them. It is not our 

 intention to extoll these accomplishments, since there is no 

 reason for duplicating this information. Here and there we 

 have pointed out some wise administrative acts, but have 

 concentrated our attention on a few of the less publicized 

 administrative shortcomings. The administrators have made 

 mistakes and, being human, do not admit them. Since these 

 errors affect millions, the public is entitled to know about 

 them. 



Avoidable Waste Negligible 



i 



Many persons explain the shortage of food in terms of 

 waste. The consumer rarely wastes much of the highly prized 

 foods. Regardless of whether this waste is normally a large 

 or a small amount, it decreases when the price of food rises. 

 Waste on the part of the consumer is no explanation of 

 tl?e present food shortage. Highly prized foods are too valu- 

 able to be wasted. 



In time of war there is considerable waste of food on the 

 part of the armed forces. The Quartermaster General's data 



