Word: wool
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...more immediately concerned about what had already happened while his back was turned. In one industry which was so vital to other countries that a breakdown in negotiations at this point could mean the breakdown of the whole Geneva Conference, Congress had virtually declared economic war. The industry was wool, of which the British Commonwealth nations annually produce more than 1.7 billion pounds, must export more than 800 million pounds...
Little but Loud. The background of Congress' action was enough to make World Businessman Clayton give up in despair. Wool-growing is not a vital U.S. industry. It is a small, uneconomic business which assays at less than 1/1000 of the national income. But it has powerful friends-Congressmen and Senators from 23 wool-growing states, who can bleat as loudly as storm-whipped rams while trading support of bills to protect Southern peanut-growers for bills to protect Western sheep-raisers...
Four years ago, in order to save their dwindling industry, they induced the Roosevelt Administration to begin a wool-buying program. The Commodity Credit Corporation bought every pound of domestic wool at a fixed price. But Australia, which is much more efficient at sheep-raising and must sell wool or go bankrupt, sold to U.S. manufacturers at a lower price, in spite of the tariff wall. Combed U.S. wool was priced at $1.20; combed Australian, generally a finer grade, was sold at $1.09, which included 34? tariff. U.S. manufacturers bought Australian wool while U.S. wool piled up in Government warehouses...
...question now was what to do with it. The CCC could be authorized to sell it below the parity price-at a loss of millions of dollars. Furthermore, British Commonwealth operators, determined to hang on to the U.S. market, would undoubtedly cut their prices below CCC's. U.S. wool-growers still clamored for Government support, which meant that more & more domestic wool would be dumped into the Government's lap, would have to be resold somehow, somewhere...
Hope Bill. Nevertheless, the Senate by a voice vote passed a bill proposed by Wyoming's Senator Edward V. Robertson, which directed CCC to go on buying wool through 1948, sell it at cut prices to meet the competition of foreign wool, and take the loss. The Robertson bill authorized $130 million to finance the program...