The Fireside Chats of Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Radio Addresses to the American People Broadcast Between 1933 and 1944Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano)
History
The Fireside Chats of Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Radio Addresses to the American People Broadcast Between 1933 and 1944
Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano)
Depressions -- 1929 -- United States -- Sources; New Deal, 1933-1939 -- Sources; Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano), 1882-1945 -- Oratory -- Sources; Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano), 1882-1945 -- Political and social views -- Sources; United States -- Economic conditions -- 1918-1945
American industry has searched the outside world to find new
markets--but it can create on its very doorstep the biggest and
most permanent market it has ever had. It needs the reduction of
trade barriers to improve its foreign markets, but it should not
overlook the chance to reduce the domestic trade barrier right
here--right away--without waiting for any treaty. A few more
dollars a week in wages, a better distribution of jobs with a
shorter working day will almost overnight make millions of our
lowest-paid workers actual buyers of billions of dollars of
industrial and farm products. That increased volume of sales ought
to lessen other cost of production so much that even a considerable
increase in labor costs can be absorbed without imposing higher
prices on the consumer.
I am a firm believer in fully adequate pay for all labor. But right
now I am most greatly concerned in increasing the pay of the
lowest-paid labor--those who are our most numerous consuming group
but who today do not make enough to maintain a decent standard of
living or to buy the food, and the clothes and the other articles
necessary to keep our factories and farms fully running.
Farsighted businessmen already understand and agree with this
policy. They agree also that no one section of the country can
permanently benefit itself, or the rest of the country, by
maintaining standards of wages and hours far inferior to other
sections of the country.
Most businessmen, big and little, know that their government
neither wants to put them out of business nor to prevent them from
earning a decent profit. In spite of the alarms of a few who seek
to regain control of American life, most businessmen, big and
little, know that their government is trying to make property more
secure than ever before by giving every family a real chance to
have a property stake in the nation.
Whatever danger there may be to the property and profits of the
many, if there be any danger, comes not from government's attitude
toward business but from restraints now imposed upon business by
private monopolies and financial oligarchies. The average
businessman knows that a high cost of living is a great deterrent
to business and that business prosperity depends much upon a low
price policy which encourages the widest possible consumption. As
one of the country's leading economists recently said, "The
continuance of business recovery in the United States depends far
more upon business policies, business pricing policies, than it
does on anything that may be done, or not done, in Washington."
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account