Word: steelmen
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Many a Congressman has had the same mixed feelings about the steel companies as Mr. Dooley had about the trusts. In Washington last week, some Senators seemed about to do a bit of stomping on the steelmen. But from the wings there were cries of "Not so fast...
More in sorrow than in anger, steelmen stomped into the Senate caucus room last week. They were not there, as one of them said, to defend the latest boost in the price of steel (TIME, Dec. 26); they didn't think they had to. But they wanted to explain it to the Joint Committee on the Economic Report...
...Damned If I'm Not." Other steelmen showed that it takes more than the push of a button to get results. Even with higher prices, said Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp.'s President Ben Moreell, his company expects lower profits per ton this quarter than in the first nine months of 1949. As for dividends, said he, over the past 27 years they have averaged only 1.6% of the asset value of J. & L. stock. To give stockholders a fair return of 8% under present tax allowances for depreciation, Moreell figures that J. & L. would have to boost prices...
Just what the hearings had accomplished was doubtful. They were probably not much more than a warning to the steelmen to go slow on price rises. For in a free market, they still had a right to charge what the traffic would bear, whether or not it was good public relations to do so. Last week, with steel operations at 93.9% of capacity, it looked as if the traffic was still bearing up mighty well...
When the pension issue came to a head in October in the 42-day steel strike that idled 500,000 workers, steelmen showed a notable lack of industrial statesmanship. U.S. Steel tried to rally support, as a matter of principle, for its contention that workers as well as management should contribute to pensions. But precedent was against its plea. As far back as 1904, Du Pont, for example, had set up a noncontributory plan; there were an estimated 4,500 other such plans in operation in the U.S. When steelmen finally gave in and guaranteed $100-a-month pensions (including...