The Harvester World: Volume 7, number 2, February 1916

              If there is a catch in the plan, the brightest men of the country, engaged in legal, finan¬ cial, and other enterprises, have not discovered it. With one accord they commend it as fair and congratulate the organization upon its advantages. We will confess that we cannot understand the man who claims to believe there is a joker in this simple, broad, and fair plan.
4. New employes who will not get as profits one per cent of their previous year's wages.
Even without that one per cent, the plan is an exceptionally attractive savings proposition. The rates of interest are high; it leads to stock ownership; and it will start its subscribers on the sure road to saving. The man who gets used to feeling that he is putting something aside each month will never be satisfied with spending everything and saving nothing.
5. Those who procrastinate until after March first and then procrastinate some more.
This is but one of the things that the put- ting-off habit has cost them. A good begin¬ ning for those people to make to break their vicious habit would be to subscribe for a profit sharing certificate now.
The Harvester World advocates that that other thirty per cent, —that thirty out of one hundred — be accounted for and brought into the fold of good business. It is nobody's wish to coerce anyone into this plan. The officers of the Company do not want ninety or ninety- five per cent of the employes in any plant to become subscribers simply because some other plant has that number. They want every emplo3'e who subscribes, to feel that it is to his individual interest to do so. But we wish every subscriber would take the trouble to investigate the reasons and excuses of his coworkers in his department, on his floor, or at his agency. There are a few days left before March ist. Let us get after that other thirty per cent. Let us make the sentiment of the emploj'es, themselves, very strongly in favor of profit sharing subscription. Let us show the executive officers that we appreciate what they have done and that we welcome the chance to save money and own stock in the Companj'.
Let us make this plan unanimous.

FARMER IS MADE THE GOAT

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Under normal conditions of competition, such as existed before the Comision seized the market, the price would have declined from last year's figure. The price is therefore arbitrary and unwarranted.
Thus the American farmer is to be forced to pay tribute to a fibre trust financed with American capital. For every cent added to the price of twine through the operations of the sisal monopoly, $2,500,000 will be added to the binder twine bill of the American farmer.
SISAL TRUST HIT BY HOUSE RESOLUTION
Another shot was taken at the sisal fibre trust Janu¬ ary IS, when Representative W. E. Cox of Indiana, introduced a comprehensive resolution setting forth the facts in regard to the Comision Reguladora and its financial arrangement with United States banks and asking the Speaker of the House to appoint a special committee to investigate.
An attempt is being made by the sisal trust to obtain the co-operation of various commercial associations throughout the country in an effort to stay the opposi¬ tion to its monopolistic operations. A form letter signed by Dr. Victor A. Rendon, general attorney for the Comision Reguladora, has been sent to secretaries of many of these organizations. In this letter Dr. Rendon repeats the charges he and other sisal trust representa¬ tives have made at Washington to the effect that under conditions which prevailed before the Reguladora siezed the sisal market of Yucatan, "a monopoly operating in the interest of two powerful American corporations," presumably the International Harvester Company and
the Plymouth Cordage Company, "had the Yucatan fibre in its clutches;" that it " arbitrarily fixed prices to the planters and the consumers," and that it was "detri¬ mental alike to the Yucatan fibre grower and the Ameri¬ can farmer."
When he speaks of a price-fixing monopoly Dr. Ren¬ don refers to the fibre dealers who formerly conducted business in Yucatan. Far from being a monopoly these dealers were so active in competitive methods that prices were regulated according to the supply and demand. The term monopoly as applied to them is absurd, and the assertion that they had the industry in their clutches is positively denied by men who are thoroughly famil¬ iar with the conditions.
In conclusion Dr. Rendon makes this tearful appeal:
"As a Mexican who feels the responsibility of utiliz¬ ing his capabilities for the moral, social and economic uplift of Mexico, and as a neighbor who has a friendly interest in the welfare and prosperity of the American people, I entreat you to lend your good influences to the noble work of encouraging a spirit of friendly co¬ operation between the peoples of the United States and Mexico."
This appeal would come with better grace if the organization represented by the appellant had not itself done what it charges the fibre dealers with doing, that is, fixed the price to the planter and to the cordage manufacturer, and if it had not made the spread large enough to give somebody an enormous rakeoff at the expense of both the Yucatan planter and the American farmer. It would come with better grace if the Regu¬ ladora had not used force to put the fibre dealers out of business and had not confiscated their property.