Mastodon or Mouse?

After months of racking labor, WPB and OPA last week finally brought forth their much-advertised plan 1) to put cheap essential clothing back on retailers' shelves, and 2) roll back clothing prices for the consumer. But there was a big question whether the joint travail had brought forth a mastodon or a mouse.

OPA Boss Chester Bowles was pretty sure that he had a mastodon. WPB had taken over control of 80% of the civilian supply of cottons, 80% of the woolens, and 75% of the rayon. It had set up a complicated system of priorities. Under it, WPB will dole out materials after April 15 only to manufacturers who will make the kind of clothes that OPA wants, e.g., children's wear, cheap dresses, etc.

Double Check. As an additional check on the clothesmakers, OPA Boss Bowles announced his part of the project, the Maximum Average Price Order. Under M.A.P. manufacturers must sell their products to retailers at the average weighted price of their products in late 1942 and early 1943. For example, a manufacturer who sold three lines of dresses at $10, $12 and $14 during that period has an average price under M.A.P. of $12. If he has since dropped his cheaper and less profitable lines, as many have, his "average" is now $14. To bring it down, again, he must resume making cheaper dresses.

Bowles hopes this will eventually cut the consumer's clothing bill some 7%. As one more check, almost all retail cotton garments made after March 5 must carry dollars & cents ceiling prices.

No Check? But many a merchandiser and consumer pessimistically dubbed the grandiose plan a mouse. A prime flaw, they asserted, was a lack of quality controls. Without a check on quality, there was no reason why a manufacturer could not conform to M.A.P., yet still make shirts that fell apart in a few washings.

Beyond that, OPA and WPB relied on little more than a pious hope that textile mills would turn out enough cheap materials to fill priorities. There was nothing in the plan to make them do it.

Furthermore, the entire plan might be knocked on the head if: 1) the armed services greatly increase orders, or 2) the textile industry, with some 200,000 less workers than in 1941, fails to solve it? manpower and wage troubles.

The plan had one immediate effect OPA had not counted on. In Manhattan, there was a rush to buy goods which OPA had listed as non-essential--i.e., items to be made from the small amount of "free materials" left over when all priorities are met. It took no expert to see that many "nonessentials" might disappear from the market entirely. These included neckties, handbags, etc. But they also included men's overcoats, raincoats and women's panties.

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