Despite the fact that the Air Corps Act of 1926 had made provision for this type of profit control, Congress had passed an amendment to the Vinson-Trammel Act in 1934, imposing a further statutory limit on profits under contracts for shipbuilding and aircraft production. The wartime Excess Profits Tax purported to further regulate profits but of course only created waste. The manufacturer had to add the tax to the price of his product anyway. The act encouraged management to take decisions which, though unsound economically, looked smart taxwise. Expense accounts chargeable to cost of product soared to heights undreamed of in competitive business. Political in character, uneconomic in principle, the Excess Profits Tax swelled the costs of war while giving a false impression of profit limitation. The Price Adjustment Act, commonly called “renegotiation,” was the really effective means of profit control. Under it, competent price adjustment boards set up the ground rules and administered them with justice to those concerned. Yet this legislation, despite the fact that it was fundamentally in the interest of private industry, was passed with such a flavor of punitive action against business that even the wisest industrialists were tricked into fighting it as just another attack on the profit motive. Too many of us, unfortunately, were so busy hating Roosevelt that we forgot how to use our brains. Under wise leadership the whole thing could have been turned around into a constructive effort. Had the administration called in representatives from the many industries and put the problem squarely before them along with an appeal to their patriotism, there would have been no problem. Voluntary, industry-wide action would have been forthcoming to keep industry on a sound financial basis, and the example thus set must certainly have brought wage rates within bounds. Had a routine been set up under which the government agreed to utilize privately owned facilities on terms that would compensate owners for their use and restore them as nearly as possible to their original status, details could have been handled by price adjustment boards in a cooperative manner. Punitive laws could have been reserved for culprits, and industry would have helped police the economy.