872 ' REPORT ON COOPERATION IN AMERICAN EXPORT TRADE.

strength, control more capital and resources, can dictate terms, ete.
About 15 of these replies did not specify whether the foreign competition
 mentioned represented a combination or not. Four mentioned
 unfair foreign competition in this connection. Thus, a prominent
 professor of political economy wrote:
I think they would be in the public interest. In foreign markets American
producers encounter several difficulties, among which not the least is aggressive
competition on the part of foreign producers. Some of these, notably those of
Germany, are organized into powerful combinations which are not only permitted
 by the laws of their Government but encouraged and assisted in important
ways. Unless American producers are permitted to combine similarly, they will
be at a disadvantage in two ways. First, competition among themselves will
tend to discredit American products. Second, unless producers on a great scale,
they will not have the necessary capital to push their separate products in
foreign markets. So long as the combination is open on fair and equal terms
to all American manufacturers who desire to share in its advantages, only
good, so far as I can see, would result to American interests.
An Ohio editor wrote:

They are a practical instrument, being the only known method of mobilizing
and concentrating all the skill and knowledge, all the financial, industrial,
agricultural, commercial, and political resources of the United States for the
purposes of international competition. Such competition exists, and while it
continues the United States must be prepared to cope with it successfully if
trade with foreign markets is desired.
A small manufacturer of metal alloy, exporting 5 per cent of his
product, wrote:

Business is a great deal like war—you have to have as good a weapon as
your opponent. If American business must compete with foreign selling comhinations,
 we should not only be permitted the same weapon. but should be
assisted in its perfection and use.
A large manufacturer and exporter of reinforcing steel wrote:
The cooperative selling plan would enable American manufacturers to effectively
 meet the cooperative buying organizations of Europe which, by reason
of their control of enormous orders for certain classes of commodities, have
been one of the most potent factors in depressing prices of American products
sold for export.
Elimination of competition between American concerns.—Expressing
 what might be termed the complement of the above ideas, about
60 replies give in substance the reason that export combinations will
eliminate competition between American firms both at home and
abroad for foreign trade and enable them better to meet foreign competition.

Thus a large manufacturer of electrical apparatus wrote:
By cooperation * * * there would be less likelihood of destructive competition
 which is noneconomie from every viewpoint and detrimental to the interests
of the whole country. It is sufficiently difficult to meet the competition of the
foreign manufacturer without having the additional burden of competing with
the domestic exporter. With reference to the larger corporations, at present
they have a decided advantage over the smaller corporation by being able to
know and reach the foreign market, but even with them, competition is such as
to often reduce prices to a point which shows no profit, but merely helps cover
overhead charges.
A prominent Indiana milling concern wrote:
Manufacturers of the raw products of the United States will secure therefor
full value in foreign markets when there is eliminated the fierce competition
for the foreign trade between manufacturers of the same product in this country.
 This in turn would * * * place the manufacturer in an economical
position to pay more for his raw products and for his labor.