Where the Consumer's Dollar Goes

Abstract

E VERY commission and every expert seems to agree that there is no simple answer to the coal question. So with that part of the coal question assigned as the subject of this paper, there is no simple answer. Not in figures at least. It is hard to trace the coal consumer's dollar back to the mine. It is impossible from any statistics that have been gathered to make a satisfactory approximation of the number of cents that go to the various factors between the coal in the ground and the coal in its ultimate bin. Yet broadly the question can be answered; not quantitatively, but answered in the sense that we can point out that too much of it goes here, too much of it there, too much of it yonder. From the studies of the Coal Commission we can reach a conclusion as to what pockets are big with unreasonable profits and see broadly where the rule of reason .will have to be applied if the consumer's dollar is to go further than it does now. With a gap in the data because of the fact that the Coal Commission's reports on cost, investment, and profit of bituminous operators are not yet released, I shall try to state in this paper the facts now available on the subject, and my conclusions therefrom, regarding the retailers and wholesalers who handle both hard and soft coal, and regarding the hard coal operators. Absence of data on the soft coal mining profits throws the emphasis of my paper unavoidably on the anthracite situation.