The X. Y. Z. of the Situation.
"An army of more than 1,500,000 men is employed directly in the operation and maintenance of the railroads in the United States, and millions of other men are furnished employment indirectly in the mines, the forests and the factories, supplying the railroads with approximately one and one-quarter billions of dollars' worth of material and equipment annually consumed.
"These are wonderfully interesting and impressive facts; but the fact of greater interest and worthy of the most careful thought of every citizen of this country is that this vast army of men engaged in producing the commodity of transportation at an average cost more than 40 per cent lower than is shown by any other country is paid an average wage more than 50 per cent higher than is paid in any other country where railroads exist."
(W. C. Brown, before the Michigan Manufacturers' Association, June 22, 1908.)
LESSON I.
Freight Rates and the Clothes We Wear.
Whom have we here?
Eleven different types of American citizens, standing in a row, clad in the varied uniforms or togs of their several occupations or leisure from hod-carrier to the dude in dress suit and opera hat.
These men all live in the Mississippi Valley.