. The story of American democracy, political and industrial . y of the Treasury, startledthe country by announcing that the coal mine owners, ac-cording to their own income tax reports to the government,had made immense profits the preceding year, many of themover 100 per cent on their entire capital stock (which in-cluded vast amounts of water) and some of them 2000per cent — at a time too when their workmen at the requestof a government board were toiling patriotically for a lowerreal wage than before the war. And Mr. Basil , one of the joint chairmen of the War Labor Board. THE ORGY
. The story of American democracy, political and industrial . y of the Treasury, startledthe country by announcing that the coal mine owners, ac-cording to their own income tax reports to the government,had made immense profits the preceding year, many of themover 100 per cent on their entire capital stock (which in-cluded vast amounts of water) and some of them 2000per cent — at a time too when their workmen at the requestof a government board were toiling patriotically for a lowerreal wage than before the war. And Mr. Basil , one of the joint chairmen of the War Labor Board. THE ORGY OF PROFITEERING 753 has since published figures and facts to show that statement was far too moderate. Quite as out-rageous was the i)rofiteering of the meat packers and thesteel mills, just when every good citizen was stinting hislife so as to buy Liberty bonds — the proceeds from whichwere being used by the government to purchase theexorbitantly priced goods out of which these companieswere making their vile profits. Vast war fortunes, American Airplanes in Military Formation over an aviation fit4d in Texas-At our entrance into the war our papers boasted that some of our planes would blind the German giant- But despite the expenditure of a billion dollars inthe enterprise, we failed, during the remaining year and a half of war, to placefighting planes of our manufacture on the front- Reputable engineers havemade charges — as yet uninvestigated — that the failure was due to graft aswell as to mismanagement-were made in munitions and in many other lines, and, bycommon computation, some seventeen thousand warmillionaires sprang up. Nor has the government provedresolute enough to punish one biff profiteer. During the struggle we boasted loudly that this war wasbeing paid for by the rich, not by the workers. It mighthave been paid for so, if we had conscripted the wealthof these war profiteers as zealously as we conscripted thelife of our splendid youth fo
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, bookidstoryofameri, bookyear1922
