Word: prices
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...Bark. There was no doubt that the stock market, which had been as certain as everyone else of a G.O.P. victory, was panicked by all the Democratic talk of stand-by price controls, an excess-profits tax, repeal of the Taft-Hartley Act, and demands for wage boosts from tough, confident unions backed by a labor-minded Administration (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS). But calmer businessmen recalled that it was a Democratic Congress which had let OPA die, that President Truman had approved the repeal of the wartime excess-profits tax in 1945, and that wage boosts were bound to come anyway...
...farther businessmen were from Wall Street, the less they were upset by the election. The Wall Street Journal surveyed the U.S. and found that no one was canceling expansion plans or retrenching. And many businessmen were less worried about price controls-even stand-by ones -than the fact that buyers were shying away from many items at present prices-and prices would have to come down anyway...
...many a radio store last week, hired snoops shopped busily for bargains. They were paid to hunt radio & television sets selling for less than the manufacturer's factory list price. Stores that made cut-rate sales were summarily cut off from factory shipments. Something called "fair trade" was at work...
Time was when any U.S. merchant was free to sell anything in the house at any price he set. But now, for a steadily growing list of "brand-name" products, such free competition is forbidden by law in 45 U.S. states. In addition to radio & television sets, the list includes drugs, books, jewelry, liquor, sporting goods, kitchenware, cigars, cosmetics, electric appliances...
...Rate. This hobbling of free competition began with retail druggists, who feared that cut-rate chains would put them out of business. In 1931, they rammed the first effective fair-trade act through the California legislature; it gave manufacturers and retailers the power to fix the resale price of commodities bearing a trademark. Later, the National Association of Retail Druggists lobbied the same law through other state legislatures. Fearing a clash with federal antitrust laws, the druggists in 1937 drummed the Miller-Tydings Act through Congress. It enabled many others besides druggists to fix prices...