( 237 ) 



Fixing the thermometer is a handicap to a physician when 

 an emergency arises. Fixed prices are a handicap to a nation 

 when a war is under way. The fluctuating thermometer tells 

 a physician whether previous acts were correct and gives him 

 some guide as to how he should act in the future. If the physi- 

 cian's thermometer were fixed so that it could not fluctuate, 

 he would have to depend on his own judgment and the grunts 

 and groans of his patient. In a regimented economy with fixed 

 prices, the food and price administrators, like the physician 

 with the fixed thermometer, must depend on their judgment 

 and the grunts and groans of their patients to determine the 

 effect of previous policies and to guide their future action. 



"Squealometer" Needed 



A frozen price structure and a fixed thermometer call for 

 the development of a machine which, for want of a better 

 name, might be termed a "squealometer." This machine is 

 merely a reversion to the horse-and-buggy days when the 

 wheel that squealed the most got the grease. There is only 

 one method of advising the administrators of their mistakes 

 public protest in sufficient volume to be recorded by the 

 "squealometer." In a regimented economy, when decisions 

 are made by small numbers of men and are based on the de- 

 cisions of other men, the number of errors inevitably is large. 

 The administrator may soon learn that an error has been 

 made, but be loath to correct it, as few persons are willing to 

 admit they are wrong unless forced to do so. Even though the 

 administrator knew he was wrong and was sufficiently cou- 

 rageous to admit it, the system would probably prevent him 

 from making the change. The correction of one person's error 

 puts others in a bad light. Unfortunately, changes in policy 

 cannot be piecemeal. A courageous man working within an 

 organization might make a change in the right direction over 

 the protests of his co-administrators, but with basic policy 



