It is easy to make mistakes in our treatment of the socially unfit. A good illustration is furnished by the prejudice that prevails with regard to the products of convict labor. It is admitted that the inmates of penitentiaries ought to be made to work, but the prod ucts of their labor, it is held, should not be sold in the general markets, for that would lessen the de mand for honest labor. This prejudice is economi cally unsound. The production of goods by con victs, if encouraged and wisely directed, would be beneficial from every point of view ; it would not lessen the earnings of honest laboring men by a dollar.
12. National efficiency.—Few business men realize how much of their prosperity they owe to certain social conditions and institutions which seem to have no re lation whatever to business. Conspicuous among such institutions are the school and the church. The one makes for intelligence, the other for honesty and clean living. Without their influence no nation could realize any high ideal of efficiency. The monogamist family is another institution of much unsuspected im portance in the business world. No nation of polyga mists has ever achieved distinction in business or foreig,n trade.
In a country lacking a system of general education, or of moral training such as it is the aim of the church to give, business men would be seriously handicapped by the poor and untrustworthy quality of their em ployes. A great executive can accomplish little if lie is surrounded by men who do not understand his.plans. He needs wise subordinates upon whom he can depend just as a great general needs good soldiers.
Self interest as well as patriotism demands, there fore, that the business man help to foster all social institutions which increase the efficiency and strengthen the character of the average citizen. Upon that efficiency and character the continuance and growth of a nation's material prosperity abso lutely- depend, and that is a matter of vital concern to every business man. As Mr. Vanderlip has elo quently said in a recent address: There are times in the world which call men away from their personal and immediate interests. There are periods that compel them to think together of fundamental things. Surely the present is such a time. It seems almost idle to discuss the working of banking statutes when we can discern, even tho dimly, the working of great laws in the statute book of human nature and society, whose action is so funda mental and important as to make our men-made laws and their workings seem inconsequential in comparison. We are in a time when it is of the utmost importance that we think socially and fundamentally. These are not days when we can give our thoughts exclusively to our business, to our im mediate affairs. They are days that demand that we think nationally and internationally rather than individually- or as a business class. We are confronted by an insistent need
for comprehending fundamentals.
13. Inflexibility of eustom.—It is of practical im portance that business men know enough about soci ology to understand the rigidity and inflexibility of custom. When a people once get into the habit of doing a certain thing in a certain way, the business man who runs counter to that custom will get into trouble. As we all know, it is exceedingly difficult to correct a bad personal habit, it seems part of our nature. But customs are changed with much greater difficulty than habits. They are reenforced personal habits. Each individual member of a community clings to an old custom with tenacity not only for the reason that it is a habit with him, but also because it has the complete approval of his associates. The cus tom may be absurd, illogical, uneconomic, but you can not uproot it merely by exposing its absurdity and wastefulness. It -svill yield to change very gradually, and for a time those who make improvements will be sneered at as queer, not practical.
The American people, for example, have long railed at the custom of tipping the Pullman car porter, but only women are brave enough to violate the custom. New Yorkers write letters to the newspapers con demning the custom requiring the checking of coats and hats at restaurants, but if they dine at a restau rant the next day they meekly band the hat-boy his tip.
The law itself is often powerless to change a busi ness custom.. The new Federal Reserve Banking Law which is described in the Modern Business Text on "Ranking" was designed to bring about a change in certain credit customs in the United States. In Europe buyers of goods get credit by means of what is called the bill of exchange, a credit instrument much more useful and flexible than the promissory note which is in common use in the United States, but the bill of exchange is the product of a custom new in the United States; it is the result of the creditor drawing on the debtor, the latter accepting the draft. It re mains to be seen whether the business men of the United States will avail themselves of the opportunity offered by the new law and adopt this European custom.
Custom owes its inflexibility largely to the human passion for imitation. In this respect man can cer tainly claim some kinship to the ape. Our imitation of others is sometimes the result of our desire for their approbation, but usually it is unconscious and in stinctive, and it takes more than a sermon or a lecture to convince a man that his subordinance to any foolish custom is evidence of weakness. The business man must bear in mind that the customs of a country or of a community are part of its second nature. He must not ignore or ridicule them, and if he seeks to eradicate them he must be content with slow progress.