Henry Ford's Idea: "More Planning"

Having been head of the firm that bears his name for 30 years, Henry Ford II is the senior man in the U.S. auto industry. He also has few rivals for outspoken candor. Other auto chiefs fairly shuddered last November when Ford warned that the industry was headed into "a depression" and called for a big tax on gasoline to finance aid to the jobless. In an interview with TIME'S Detroit bureau chief Edwin Reingold last week, Ford confessed amazement at the depth of uncertainty that he finds about the economic future, even in Detroit. "I've never seen a time like this, when nobody even has an opinion," he said. That does not apply to Ford himself, however. Among his points:

ON LONG-RANGE PLANNING. The U.S. has problems, and one of them is that it is always swinging one way or the other like a pendulum. We never plan anything. Take air-and water-pollution control, for instance. Suddenly there is a great big flap, and everybody gets excited, and all of a sudden some law is passed; it's got to be done within a very short time frame and it costs you a fortune to do it. You can't clean up the country in four years.

I think there's got to be more central planning. Not the kind of central planning the Russians have, where they order the whole damned economy from a central plan. I'm talking about a federal planning organization that collects and disseminates information.

I'd bring in the Council of Economic Advisers and others, and I'd give this group Cabinet status so that it is not just stuck away in some back room. It's got to be visible. People may think badly of the idea, simply because anything that smells of planning and Government stinks. To me, it makes sense.

Some would worry that over the years, this kind of group would tend to be giving orders, deciding who gets what or when. That's not what I'm talking about. A timetable, cost effectiveness --those kind of things--a look at population growth; usages of raw materials, their availability, where they come from; what the price situation is going to be over a long period of time; other things that any one organization can do for itself only in a very limited way. Take a certain number of people and a certain gross national product, and how much steel do you need in a year? What kind of growth do you expect? We're going to need all kinds of plans.

ON FIGHTING THE RECESSION. We need a tax cut this year of 10% for individuals making $25,000 or less.* This may not be the answer in total, but I think it's going to help.

Also, business is in trouble because it has not been able to finance itself to provide productive jobs, and so I would hope for big increases in the investment tax credit [now 7% for industrial companies and 4% for utilities]. If it's for one year, I would like to see it at least 12% or 14% or something dramatic because I think it's very necessary. But if it's a continuing thing, I think 10% for industry generally and also for the utilities would be good.

ON POLLUTION CONTROL. It's just disaster. In our own plants, the estimated bill for air-and water-pollution control equipment is $64 million this year. It's $107 million in 1976 and $164 million in 1977. In a sense that's all nonproductive money. We don't produce a job by doing that. And despite the cost of money and the unemployment these days, here we are required by the Government to spend this ridiculous amount of funds. I think we have to look at both the cost effectiveness and whether the customer is willing to pay. What it boils down to is whether a guy living in Des Moines is supposed to pay to clean up the smog in Los Angeles?

ON ENERGY. We're still living in a fool's paradise in this country. We have always thought that we could have an endless supply of cheap energy and we can't. We've got a major energy problem, but the American people don't believe it. We waste so much. We waste everything in this country.

ON CONSERVATION. I wonder, theoretically, if it's right that the auto industry should chew up as much raw materials as it chews up. I don't think we've done as much as we should with scrap. A lot more should be done with recycling materials.

ON LEGISLATION COVERING CARS. I don't know what kind of law we're going to get out of Congress, but we're sure as hell going to get some kind of law. I don't know if it's going to be gas-consumption regulation or taxes on the size of cars. Whatever the laws are will probably move us to smaller, lighter cars.

ON THE FUTURE OF THE CAR. We are just not attuned to getting anywhere any other way than by automobile. Some people ride buses. Now trains are coming back--but it's a fad. This country developed in a particular way because of the automobile, and you can't just push a button and change it.

* President Ford's proposed graduated tax cut would be greater in varying degrees for almost everyone in the $25,000-or-under bracket.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.