Norman Beasley Quotes
With his Model T, Henry Ford affected the world more than any other man in 1500 years.
Norman Beasley, Historian, With His Model T, 1947
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
What Mises says in this quotation is true. What he does not say that by the time the automobile was developed and then the airplane, the Railroad monopoly had impeded and destroyed so many different entities that the governments had cracked down and curtailed much of the ability of the Railroads to exercise monopolist power. If the Railroads had as much power in 1920 as they did in 1870, there probably never would have been a thriving auto industry and the airlines would likely never have succeeded. Mises again exaggerates a basic point that large monopolistic companies and industries often have not been able to stave off new technology and approaches. While true in many cases, the cause is not necessarily fundamental to economics but has sometimes (as with the railroads) been caused by Government regulation and reform. A better example is that the large sail dominated shipping industry was not able to stop the coal fired steam engine ships. Indeed the shipping owners embraced the new technology. The best examples of Mises point occurred after Mises died. For example, Microsoft was not able to prevent Google from dominating many of Microsoft’s positions in the IT world.
This historical quotation shows the extremely rapid pace that the world adopted a technology once it had been mechanized—in this case: steel.
Ford’s associate Henry Sorenson also was deeply involved with developing the concept of an assembly line. History has tended to give the credit to Ford as he was the boss. However, it is doubtful that either man thought of the concept independently by mutually and collegially developed and implemented the idea.
Ford, an inveterate racist and anti-Semitic in his old age was very liberal when he first started and accomplished so much. He not only hired foreigners, but also some men of his initial workforce were handicapped. He was proud of the fact that jobs could be created on his concept of an assembly line that was so specialized that handicapped people could be productive workers as they did not have to do everything in the manufacturing process. Since the assembly line did the moving, men who had trouble walking could sit and be very productive at some tasks. Further, Ford did not try and pay his assembly line workers less than the going wage because their skills could be much narrower. He actually doubled the salaries (see {642361}) and picked men who were not wed to the older, traditional way of manufacturing things. The productivity came from the engineering of the cars and the assembly line, not be cutting wages, a practice that he did not continue as he grew older and tried to make his money the traditional way of exploiting the workers more. When the other auto companies had recognized the union, the elder Ford would not.
Steel workers were then paid $1.75 for a 9 hour day. This was earthshaking.
Norman Beasley was an American journalist and author, best known for writing biographies. He also served in the United States Army as a colonel.
