is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig.. 11. U. S. Corn Production, 1839-1945
Data decennial 1839-1870, quinquennial 1870-1895, annual 1898-1945. A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 12. U. S. Cotton Production, 1830-1945
Data decennial 1830-1850, annual thereafter. Two distinct trends are shown, one prior to and the other following the Civil War. The latter has been projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 13. U. S. Wool Production, 1840-1943
Data decennial 1840-1860, annual thereafter. Two distinct trends are shown, one prior to and one following the Tariff Act of 1924. The latter has been projected tentatively to1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 14. U. S. Wheat Production, 1839-1945
Data decennial 1839-1870, quinquennial 1870-1895, annual 1898—1945. A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 15. Malt Liquor in the United States
Consumption 1839-1920. Production 1921-1944. Data decennial 1839-1859, annual 1863-1944. The effect of prohibition is clearly indicated. A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 16. U. S. Lumber Production, 1839-1945
Data decennial 1839-1899 (1849 missing), annual 1904-1945. First two points are estimated from value data. A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 17. U. S. Cotton Spindles in Operation, 1839-1945
Data decennial 1839-1880, annual 1880-1945. A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 18. U. S. Coal Production, 1840-1943
Data decennial 1840-1850, quinquennial 1850-1870, annual thereafter. A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 19. U. S. Smelter Copper Production, 1850-1943
Data quinquennial 1850-1870, annual thereafter. A new cycle of growth, coinciding with the birth of the electrical industry, began in 1880. Two trends are shown, the present trend projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Fig. 20. U. S. Refined Primary Lead Production, 1830-1943
Data decennial 1830-1850, quinquennial 1850-1870, annual thereafter. Here again two cycles of growth are in evidence. The beginning of the second cycle coincides with the junction of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific tracks at Utah in 1869, when western lead ores were made available to market. Two trends are shown, the present trend projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
IV
Trends in Some Other Industries
During the thirties when panaceas were sought on every hand for the then prevailing depression, hopes were expressed time and again that a new industry would spring up to absorb the unemployment slack. “Something like automobiles” was the comparison frequently heard. No industry capable of fulfilling the expressed hope appeared. Nor does it seem probable that one will appear on today’s postwar scene with enough drive to take up whatever slack in employment may develop in the late forties or early fifties.
It is true that we have a number of relatively new industries. It is equally true that a number of them hold promise of great national service, and eventual large expansion. But from what we know of trends, we are now able to understand that industries follow an orderly pattern of growth, just as do all other organisms. They do not spring full-blown upon the world. Any great industry that can function to create impressive employment in the immediate postwar years is with us right now. It is already on the scene, with an established rate of growth subject to our examination. Furthermore, while these industries offer interesting careers, they are forging ahead with methods that usually produce more material with less human effort than do the processes of older competitors.
What about the various chemical industries, for instance? These are a group of industries hailed as the probable savior of the nation’s future, a new frontier that will indefinitely extend the nation’s progress to ever higher standards of living. Figure 1 provides an answer for one such industry — rayon. Rayon may be viewed as perhaps typical of the young chemical industries. Ignore its wartime distortions, and observe the basic trend. It has a gratifying and interesting course of growth lying ahead of it. Its owners will doubtless make money. But it seems doubtful if they will create any phenomenal amount of extra employment. The fact is that practically none of our chemical industries makes for a volume of direct employment as compared to industries of analogous dollar sales volumes founded in an older era. There are technological reasons involved.
Fig. 1. U. S. Rayon Yarn Consumption, 1911-1945
A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Suppose we consider aircraft. Aircraft was a baby industry before the war; war gave it the status of a munitions industry, and airplanes were turned out as flying platforms for bombs, in numbers limited only by our capacity to build and fly them. To appraise the prospects of the aircraft industry in postwar days we need only glance at the trend line in Fig. 2. Allow for a 100 per cent margin of error on the side of underestimate, and we would still have to conclude that following the war the aviation industry would revert to very youthful dimensions. That is just what began happening in late 1945. The two million people it was able to employ in wartime were reduced to a tenth (or less) of their number by the middle of 1946, for the purposes of building peacetime planes.
Fig. 2. U. S. Aircraft Production, 1914-1944
A trend is shown, projected tentatively to 1960. Ratio scale.
Charts showing the trend lines for some of our other younger industries suggest a similarly orderly growth — allowing for due cyclic interruptions of the kind we shall later discuss.
Some industries, like radio manufacturing
