In the second place, it has been seen that each of the express companies of the United States concentrates its activities upon a certain section of the country. That is to say, on many occasions a package traveling a long distance may be handled by two or three, or sometimes even four express companies before it reaches its destination. The wastes and superfluous costs therein are evident. There is not only the direct cost of unloading, transferring, and re-loading parcels from one express company to another—and at many points express offices and yards are the width of an entire city apart. There is also the cost of the complicated bookkeeping necessary to determine for what part of the journey of a package each express company has been responsible and accordingly to what share of the express charge each is entitled. That this cost is no mere creature of a brain hell-bent upon Government ownership is proved by the fact that of a total operating expense of $113,721,057 in 1917, exactly $32,272,795 or 30% was paid to office employees. As it stands, this is the largest single item of expense in the express business, nor does this sum include the salaries of the officers and general superintendents and minor managers, nor the salaries of their clerks and subordinates directly engaged in the managing and superintending aspects of the express business. A consolidation of the express companies of the country into one agency would end that large proportion of office work attendant upon the calculation of the pro rata returns to separate express companies, and upon the issue of separate receipts, waybills, etc., and would hence result in still further reduction of express rates.
CONSOLIDATION OF PERSONNEL
But, in the third place, there are also to be considered the expenses represented by the employees not in the offices—those on the vehicles, around the stables and garages, and on the trains. Consolidation of the express service with the postal service would result in a consolidation, not only of equipment, but also of personnel. If one truck does the work of two trucks, or four trucks of five, two truck employees can do the work of four, or eight of ten. Where one railway car does the work of two, one railway car crew can do the work of two crews. That such saving would have a not altogether inconsiderable effect upon the operating expenses and hence upon the rates of the express companies is evident from the fact that the wages of vehicle, stable, garage and train employees amounted in 1917 to $23,547,906, or 20% of the operating expenses of the express companies.
CONSOLIDATION OF OFFICES
In the fourth place, there were in the United States in 1917 some 55,000 post offices. The number of express offices is not definitely known, but it is probably in the neighborhood of 40,000. The possibilities of saving by coöperation and consolidation here are again obvious, particularly when it is remembered that a large section of the activities of practically every post office is given over to handling packages mailed under the parcel-post. Especially in many smaller cities and towns, post offices could handle with little increased cost the business now requiring separate express offices in those localities. Where post office facilities are inadequate to handle the demand now being made upon them, the present express company offices might readily serve to save the cost of additional construction and facilities in the future. The amount of rental saved merely by the consolidation of many different express offices may be indicated by reference to the recent experience of the Railroad Administration in a parallel situation. Similarly, there is possible an extensive consolidation and economizing in stables and garages, office furniture and supplies.
THE POSTAGE STAMP
In the fifth place, there is the saving represented in the very nature of the postage stamp itself, which can be sold and accepted for payment of charges only by the Post Office Department. Much of the expense of the express companies in issuing receipts, making statements, checking upon money received, etc., could be saved if the express parcels could proceed under a postage stamp.
MISCELLANEOUS SAVINGS
Finally, there are the hosts of miscellaneous items of operating expenses in which we must be led to expect saving by all other experience in consolidating similar agencies performing similar services. Some of these expenses might even be eliminated entirely under Government ownership and control. Such are the cost of superintendence and auditing, insurance, the cost of securing traffic commissions, advertising and law expenses, to say nothing of the profits paid stockholders in normal years.