The Acquisitive Society

the business men who control production. In this instance the wide differences in economic strength which exist between different mines discourage the unification which is economically desirable; naturally the directors of a company which owns “a good thing” do not desire to merge interests with a company working coal that is poor in quality or expensive to mine. When, as increasingly happens in other industries, competitive wastes, or some of them, are eliminated by combination, there is a genuine advance in technical efficiency, which must be set to the credit of business motives. In that event, however, the divergence between business interests and those of the consumers is merely pushed one stage further forward; it arises, of course, over the question of prices. If anyone is disposed to think that this picture of the economic waste which accompanies the domination of production by business interests is overdrawn, he may be invited to consider the criticisms upon the system passed by the “efficiency engineers,” who are increasingly being called upon to advise as to industrial organization and equipment. “The higher officers of the corporation,” writes Mr. H. L. Gantt of a Public Utility Company established in America during the war, “have all without exception been men of the ‘business’ type of mind, who have made their success through financiering, buying, selling, etc.⁠ ⁠… As a matter of fact it is well known that our industrial system has not measured up as we had expected.⁠ ⁠… The reason for its falling short is undoubtedly that the men directing it had been trained in a business system operated for profits, and did not understand one operated solely for production. This is no criticism of the men as individuals; they simply did not know the job, and, what is worse, they did not know that they did not know it.”

In so far, then, as “Business” and “Management” are separated, the latter being employed under the direction of the former, it cannot be assumed that the direction of industry is in the hands of persons whose primary concern is productive efficiency. That a considerable degree of efficiency will result incidentally from the pursuit of business profits is not, of course, denied. What seems to be true, however, is that the main interest of those directing an industry which has reached this stage of development is given to financial strategy and the control of markets, because the gains which these activities offer are normally so much larger than those accruing from the mere improvement of the processes of production. It is evident, however, that it is precisely that improvement which is the main interest of the consumer. He may tolerate large profits as long as they are thought to be the symbol of efficient production. But what he is concerned with is the supply of goods, not the value of shares, and when profits appear to be made, not by efficient production, but by skilful financiering or shrewd commercial tactics, they no longer appear meritorious. If, in disgust at what he has learned to call “profiteering,” the consumer seeks an alternative to a system under which product is controlled by “Business,” he can hardly find it except by making an ally of the managerial and technical personnel of industry. They organize the service which he requires; they are relatively little implicated, either by material interest or by psychological bias, in the financial methods which he distrusts; they often find the control of their professions by business men who are primarily financiers irritating in the obstruction which it offers to technical efficiency, as well as sharp and closefisted in the treatment of salaries. Both on public and professional grounds they belong to a group which ought to take the initiative in promoting a partnership between the producers and the public. They can offer the community the scientific knowledge and specialized ability which is the most important condition of progress in the arts of production. It can offer them a more secure and dignified status, larger opportunities for the exercise of their special talents, and the consciousness that they are giving the best of their work and their lives, not to enriching a handful of uninspiring, if innocuous, shareholders, but to the service of the great body of their fellow-countrymen. If the last advantage be dismissed as a phrase⁠—if medical officers of health, directors of education, directors of the cooperative wholesale be assumed to be quite uninfluenced by any consciousness of social service⁠—the first two, at any rate, remain. And they are considerable.

It is this gradual disengagement of managerial technique from financial interests which would appear the probable line along which “the employer” of the future will develop. The substitution throughout industry of fixed salaries for fluctuating profits would, in itself, deprive his position of half the humiliating atmosphere of predatory enterprise which embarrasses today any man of honor who finds himself, when he has been paid for his services, in possession of a surplus for which there is no assignable reason. Nor, once large incomes from profits have been extinguished, need his salary be large, as incomes are reckoned today. It is said that among the barbarians, where wealth is still measured by cattle, great chiefs are described as hundred-cow men. The manager of a great enterprise who is paid $400,000 a year, might similarly be described as a hundred-family man, since he receives the income of a hundred families. It is true that special talent is worth any price, and that a payment of $400,000 a year to the head of a business with a turnover of millions is economically a bagatelle. But economic considerations are not the only considerations. There is also “the point of honor.” And the truth is that these hundred-family salaries are ungentlemanly.

When really important issues are at stake everyone realizes that no decent man can stand out for his price. A general does not haggle with his government for the precise pecuniary equivalent of his contribution to victory. A sentry who gives