Some of the more important conclusions to be drawn from the facts presented in the report, the data for a part of which are not included in the above table, are: (1) The department store has not as yet eliminated the special retailer in any one line of goods; the nearest approach to such a condition is found in the distribution of the following lines: kid gloves, laces and embroideries, small wares, toys, women's clothing and furnishing goods. (2) The special retail store has been able to retain nearly the whole field in several lines, viz.: drugs and medicines, boots and shoes, furniture,

groceries, men's and boys' clothing, millinery. (3) The better organized stores, whether department or the regular retail store in form, are constantly forcing the less efficiently organized stores to the wall, resulting in lessened cost of distribution, larger sales with less profit on each article, and a lower average scale of prices to the consumer. (4) The heads of departments in the department stores are not generally recruited from the ranks of those who had previously been proprietors of retail stores; out of the 417 cases reported, 48 only had previously been at the head of a retail store of their own, 347 had not been independent proprietors, and in 22 cases their previous business was not stated.

On the whole the facts disclosed by this investigation are reassuring to those who still have faith in the stimulating and regulating effects of competition in the social order. Whether competition may yet be destroyed and monopoly achieved in either the field of industry or that of retail trade through the power of combination is as yet an open question; whether a perfect consolidation of the retailers either of one line of goods throughout a wide area or of all lines within a narrower one, would be able to establish and maintain monopolistic prices is still another. An able commercial authority recently remarked in connection with the Clafflin consolidation, that "the one thing which neither the department store nor any possible combination among stores for their mutual benefit can do is to establish an artificial range of prices," contrasting the power of such a combination in this respect with that of the "trust." A combination of retail tradesmen is not able through the power of such association to control the supply of raw material or to depend on either patent rights or a tariff wall. Their ability to affect the course of prices at all must be chiefly due to the power of combination a fact which clothes the concentration movement in the distributing of merchandise with especial interest to the economist as well as to the consumer.

Yale University.

MAURICE H. ROBINSON.

Municipal Electric Plants in Massachusetts Cities. Massachusetts contains two cities that own and operate municipal electric plants. These cities are Taunton, with a population of 31.036, and Chicopee, with 19,167 inhabitants. Both of these plants supply private consumers as well as electric street lamps, and they are the only electrical systems for general service in their respective cities. To bring out the comparative results obtained under

municipal and private ownership, a comparison is here made between these two plants at Taunton and Chicopee, and all the similar electric plants of the State under private ownership in cities with populations between those of the two named.

Five cities in Massachusetts have populations between those of Chicopee and Taunton, and contain electrical supply systems, under private management. In each of two of these five cities a single corporation owns both the gas and electric plants, and these two cities are excluded from the comparison. The three remaining cities are Gloucester, population 26,121; Quincy, population 23,899, and Pittsfield, population 21,766. The object of the comparison here made between the two municipal and the three private plants is to determine the relative costs of street lighting, and to see whether the private or public management rendered capital invested in the plants more productive. Figures showing the operations of all these plants are derived by computation or taken directly from the Report of the Massachusetts Board of Gas and Electric Light Commissioners, for the year ending June 30, 1900. In order to reduce all service to street lamps to a common unit, the usual allowance of 0.25 watt per rated candle power of arc lamps is made, and the energy supplied to lamps is reduced to kilowatthours. At Chicopee the electric street lighting is done by arc lamps of 1,200 nominal candle power, each consuming 0.25 × 1200 = 0.3 kilowatt-hour per hour. During the year named the average daily number of these lamps operated was 149, the hours per night for each lamp 8.5, and the average nights per month 29.8. Consequently the energy consumed by these lamps during the year was 8.5 x 29.8 x 12 x 0.3 x 149 135,870.12 kilowatt-hours. In Taunton during the same year the street lighting was done with an average daily number of 223 arc lamps of 1200 nominal candle power each, and these lamps were in operation 8.2 hours per night and 27.5 nights per month on an average. Street lighting at Taunton, therefore, consumed 8.2 x 27.5 x 12 x 0.3 x 223 = 181,031.4 kilowatt-hours during the year.

The cost of street lighting by each municipal plant is equal to the sum of all expenses for management and operation, plus interest on the entire investment of the rate paid on city bonds, plus depreciation at 5 per cent., minus the money income from service for private consumers. These charges against the municipal electric plants are as follows:

The value of the service performed by these municipal plants for private consumers during the year amounted to $8,706.91 at Chicopee, and $23,598.43 at Taunton. Deducting these sums from the corresponding charges against the municipal plants, the cost of street lighting at Chicopee is found to be $15,529.18, and at Taunton $14,934.72. The cost of service to street lamps per kilowatt-hour is now found by dividing the total cost of street lighting by the number of kilowatt-hours consumed in each case.

The true average cost of 9.6 cents per kilowatt-hour for both cities is found by dividing the sum of their total costs by the sum of their kilowatt-hours.

In the cities of Gloucester, Quincy and Pittsfield the arc street lamps, all of 1200 nominal candle power, operated during the year as follows:

On the basis of 0.3 kilowatt-hour for each hour of lamp operation, the energy consumed in these street lamps amounted for Gloucester to 27,197.82, for Quincy to 47,548.80, and for Pittsfield to 48,0.25.56 kilowatt-hours, during the year. The yearly charge per lamp at Gloucester was $75.00, at Quincy $75.00, and at Pittsfield $62.50 for the shorter burning, and $95.00 for the longer burning lamps. These prices make the total charge for street lighting, by the average number of lamps stated, at Gloucester $4,425.00, at Quincy $7,500.00, and at Pittsfield $5,652.00. Dividing in each case the total cost by the total kilowatt-hours consumed in the lamps gives the price per kilowatt-hour, and the sum of these total costs divided by the sum of the kilowatt-hours shows the true average price for the three cities, which is 14 cents per kilowatthour.

This average charge by the private plants for energy used in street lighting is 45.8 per cent. higher than the cost of 9.6 cents per kilowatt-hour in the municipal plants. Meter rates to private consumers at Chicopee are 11.85 cents per kilowatt-hour, and the contract price per arc lamp is $3.00 to $4.00 per month. Taunton charges $6.00 to $7.00 per month for each arc lamp, and 18 cents per kilowatt-hour by meter, subject to a discount of 25 per cent. on bills of $20.00 or more.

Nominal meter rates at Gloucester, Quincy and Pittsfield are 18, 18 and 24 respectively, while the corresponding charges for arc lamps are $8.00 to $9.00 per month at Gloucester, $6.50 at Quincy, and $8.00 to $9.00 at Pittsfield. While the rates from municipal plants to private consumers are as stated, the prices made by the private plants are subject to much variation with different consumers, and are often below the nominal rates, but probably not lower than the rates of the municipal plants, on an average.

It is next desirable to determine whether the municipal or the private electric plants earned better net returns on the invested capital. In order to do this, the money value of the street lighting done by the municipal plants must be determined. For this purpose it is only fair to compute the value of the municipal service to arc street lamps, at the average price paid for similar service in the three cities supplied by private electric systems. As shown above, the average price paid by Gloucester, Quincy and Pittsfield for electrical energy used in arc lamps was 14 cents per kilowatthour. Applying this price to the energy supplied by the two municipal plants to arc street lamps, results are obtained as follows:

These values of street lighting plus the money incomes of the

municipal plants show their entire earnings.