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government to industry.

Our industrial success has been due chiefly to the richness of our Importance natural resources on the one hand, and to the virility and energy of of good the American people on the other. But however rich in natural resources a country may be, and however industrious the individuals in control of those resources, industrial success cannot be attained without a good government. A great factor in the material prosperity of the American people, therefore, has been the helpful attitude of our government. The following passages briefly describe some of the more important services rendered American business by the Federal government:

The bureau of public health in the Treasury Department collects Public health. information as to the sanitary condition of ports and places in the

1 From various bulletins issued by the United States Government.

Work of
the Depart-
ment of
Agriculture.

Some functions of the Department of the Interior.

The De

partment of Commerce

United States and foreign countries, including existence of epidemics; conducts national quarantine service at nearly all ports of the United States and its possessions; has officers in South and Central American, Asiatic, and European ports for inspection of vessels and emigrants leaving for the United States.

The Department of Agriculture extends numerous services to the American people. The Department issues a large number of scientific and technical publications, including the Year-book, the Farmers' Bulletins series, the Monthly Weather Review, and the Crop Reporter. The scope of the Department's work may be indicated by an enumeration of the chief bureaus and divisions within it. These are the weather bureau, the office of farm management, bureau of animal industry, bureau of plant industry, forest service, bureau of chemistry, bureau of soils, bureau of entomology, bureau of statistics, bureau of experiment stations, bureau of crop estimates, office of public roads and rural engineering, bureau of markets, horticultural board, and the insecticide and fungicide board.

Several of the bureaus and divisions within the Department of the Interior perform valuable services with respect to American industry. The geological survey investigates, classifies and issues reports upon the mineral resources of the nation. The bureau of mines is concerned with the mining, quarrying, treatment and utilization of ores and other mineral substances. The patent office grants letters patent for inventions, and registers trade-marks. The reclamation service is charged with the survey, construction and operation of the irrigation works in arid states. The bureau of education collects statistics and general information showing the condition and progress of education, including commercial and industrial teaching at home and abroad.

The Department of Commerce is directly concerned with American industry and commerce. As in the case of other Federal executive departments, the work of the Department of Commerce is carried on by bureaus and boards. The bureau of the census prepares and prints decennial reports on the population and numerous industrial activities of the nation. The Department includes a bureau of fisheries, a bureau of navigation, a bureau of, lighthouses, and a steamboat inspection bureau. The bureau of standards within the

Department of Commerce has the custody of the national standards

of weights, measures, etc.

Of increasing importance is the work of the bureau of foreign and and its domestic commerce, within the Department of Commerce. This functions. bureau was created in 1912 by the consolidation of the bureau of manufactures and the bureau of statistics. The function of the bureau of foreign and domestic commerce is the investigation and promotion of American business at home and abroad. In order to fulfill this function the bureau employs a corps of commercial agents, who investigate trade conditions at home and abroad, and submit reports resulting from their observations. The bureau makes use of all available means to publish as widely as possible commercial information of interest and value to the manufacturing interests of the country.

of Labor.

The youngest of the Federal executive departments is the Depart- The Department ment of Labor, created in 1913 by the separation of the Department of Commerce and Labor into a Department of Commerce and a Department of Labor. The functions of the latter department are steadily increasing. Within this Department is the bureau of labor statistics, which compiles and publishes useful information on subjects connected with labor in the most general and comprehensive sense of that word. Important functions are performed by the bureau of immigration, the bureau of naturalization, and the children's bureau, all of which are located within the Department of Labor.

35. Keeping track of industrial tendencies 1

industry.

One of the outstanding features of American industry is its great Magnitude size and complexity. The United States is almost as large as the whole of America of Europe, yet the industries of this country must often be considered as a unit. Thus one of the most important services in business life is the systematization and interpretation of industrial data. Numerous governmental and private agencies attempt to give a bird's-eye view of industrial tendencies, with the aim of keeping the American business man in touch with fundamental facts and signifi1 From the National City Bank of New York, Monthly Business Letter, September, 1921.

General business conditions.

The industries.

The crops.

Money.

cant developments. The following excerpts are from the Monthly Business Letter, by means of which the National City Bank of New York attempts to keep track of industrial tendencies:

Monthly Business Letter for September, 1921

...

The general situation in business has changed little, with business in August quiet. If the farmers who think they are the only sufferers from falling prices knew the facts about the losses of manufacturing and trading companies they would be less unhappy about their own. There has been misery enough to go all around. . . . Bank clearings have been running about 26 per cent below those of a year ago, which in view of the fall of prices is a remarkably good showing. Railway traffic has been helped by the big grain movement, but car-loadings are about 20 per cent below last year.

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The industries are very quiet, with a few exceptions. There is said to be a little more activity in iron and steel, but the past month has seen further reductions both in wages and prices. . . The textile industries as a group are an exception to the general situation. This is particularly true in cotton goods, which have blossomed out into something resembling a real boom. .

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The grain crops are not quite up to last year, having suffered injury under the heat and dry weather of July. . . The general situation as to wheat is good. Unlike that of last year, domestic stocks of flour are small and the millers are buying grain freely. . . . The corn crop is about 200,000,000 bushels under last year's, but is around 3,000,000,000 bushels, and the carry-over from last year is very large. The oat crop is poor, but there also the carry-over is large. . . . The situation of the cotton crop would signify disaster in normal times. The acreage was reduced about 25 per cent, and now the condition of the crop forecasts a low yield per acre. . . . The demand for new money is light. While the boom was on and the tendency of prices was upward, money was in constantly increasing demand, for no matter what profits borrowers made nobody wanted to use any of them for so uninteresting a purpose as paying debts. That situation has changed. While the low prices are making money tight, the demand is for the purpose of paying old debts. The people now have their minds fixed on getting out of debt. . .

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