David Woodhead Says Lot Speculators Are The Arch-Profiteers

The following is a st,atement recently publishcd in "l-ax Facts" in Los Angeles, b1' David \\'oodhead, the well known retail lumber merchant of this city. While this statement is made regarding Los Angeles, our readers will probably find that it applies to many other places:

"Our newspapers are to blame for the opinion th'at labor and material men are responsible for the high cost ol building.

"No newspaper catl pay its way without advertising. All depend upon the big adr,ertisers for their m,aln revenue. We should not, therefore expect them to commit suicide by printing ne\4's ol opinions distastefui to, or against the financial interests of their largest a<Ivertisers.

"Real estate men are by long oclds the biggest advertisers. No newspaper, therefore, no matter how rnuch it might be convinced that lancl speculation will ieacl to a stoppage of our growth and interruption of our building campaign, can afford forcefully to present this fact to its readers in its true light.

"Artisans working for wages clo not advertise at all. Ruilding material merchants advertise very little in comparison with these real estate men. This must be the main reason, if not the only one, u.'hy newspapers in editorials and in news paragraphs a.s well as in cartoons, lose no op- portunitv to hold up to the public scorn and con<iemnation any rise in the cost of labor or building material, and declare such prices are checking building operatrons. Yet they fail to mention by a single word the greatest of all increases in the .cost of homes and factories and stores caused by the rapidly increasing cost of land.

Labor profiteers and building=material profiteers may be safely condemned hundreds of times by the aveiage newspaper without losing patronage; but to mention the giant among pygmies in the ancient art of profiteering would be dangerous. And so the lot profiteer does not exlst, so far as our newspapers are concerned.

"Let rne give you a singls illustration of the difference between the cost of a small modest, working riran's home of today, and three years ago. Three vears ago a lot such as he r,v,ould require in the South End of the town, could be bought for $500. The average home built on that lot would cost, sa_y, $2,500. About $600 of this $2,500 would be direct labor, and $1,900 for materials. Tl-re cost of the hon-re r'r,ith the lot, therefore, was $3,000.

"Today be must pay not less than $1,500 for the same lot, in fact $2,000 would be more nearly correcr. The

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