Lenin: 1916/ni-beta: HEYMANN, COMBINED ENTERPRISES (original) (raw)

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

NOTEBOOK “β”

(“BETA”)

HEYMANN, COMBINED ENTERPRISES

Hans Gideon Heymann, Combined Enterprises in the German Large-Scale Iron Industry, Stuttgart, 1904
(No. 65 of Munich Economic Studies).

A summary of data (for the most part rather fragmentary) on the advantages of large-scale production, especially “combined” production, i.e., uniting various successive stages....

| goodexample!! | | | “The representative of the Krupp firm toldthe iron Enquiry Committee (Minutes (1878),p. 82): ‘I do not think that a plant producing20,000-30,000 tons (annually) can stand upto one producing 100,000-150,000 tons.’ Twen-ty-five years later Carnegie considered that twen-ty times as much as 150,000 tons was neces-sary. (The Empire of Business, New York,Doubleday, Page and Co., 1902, p. 233):‘Concerns making one thousand tons of steelper day have little chance against one makingten thousand’” (p. 232, note). | | ------------- | | | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |

| aconditionforcartels.... | | | | The growth of capital and its “immobilisa-tion” (N.B.) is one of the most importantconditions for monopoly and cartels. | | ------------------------ | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |

“Combined enterprises often belong to more than a dozen cartels, as Völker’s interesting table shows”... (249)....

| | | | | | ---------------------------------------------------------------- | | -- | | | ? Völker? Iron cartels? December 1903 (where?) (p. 256).... | | —? | | | | | |

| “We see ... everywhere the same spectacle in theproduction of finished goods. Pure enterprises perish,are crushed between the high price of raw materialand low price of the finished product, while the com-bined enterprises earn enough profit from the highprices of materials, and they find sales thanks tothe low prices of finished goods; for the big plantsavoid excessive prices for fear of inevitable subse-quent reductions, whereas the small ones in goodtimes want to push up prices wildly. Exactly thesame policy is pursued in America by the big SteelCorporation” (256). | | | | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | ---- | | | | | N.B. | | | | | | | | | N.B. | | | | |

Now competition has been done away with. There remain two or three dozen big plants. At the head are Thyssen, Lueg and Kirdorf (261). “Two gigantic associations”: the coal syndicate and the steel syndicate ((87.5 per cent of steel output)) “must rule over the whole”.

— — — Monopoly of the means of production. The land has been bought up (coal and ore).

| “The head of the concern controls theprincipal company [literally: the “mothercompany”]; the latter reigns over the subsid-iary companies [“daughter companies”], whichin their turn control still other subsidiaries[“grandchild companies”], etc. In this way,it is possible with a comparatively smallcapital to dominate immense spheres ofproduction. Indeed, if holding 50 per centof the capital is always sufficient to controla company, the head of the concern needsonly one million to control eight millionin the second subsidiaries. And if this ‘inter-locking’ is extended, it is possible with onemillion to control sixteen million, thirty-two million, etc.”[1] (pp. 268-69). | | | betterthan inLiefmannand earlier | | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | | ---------------------------------- |

The summing up:

| | “There remain, on the one hand, the bigcoal companies, producing millions of tonsyearly, strongly organised in their coal syndi-cate, and, on the other, the big steel plants,closely allied to the coal mines, having theirown steel syndicate. These giant enterprises,producing 400,000 tons of steel per annum,with a tremendous output of ore and coaland producing finished steel goods, employing10,000 workers quartered in company housesand sometimes owning their own railwaysand ports, are the typical representativesof the German iron and steel industry. Andconcentration goes on further and further.Individual enterprises are becoming largerand larger. An ever-increasing number ofenterprises in one, or in several differentindustries, join together in giant enterprises,backed up and directed by half a dozenbig Berlin banks. In relation to the Germanmining industry, the truth of the teachingsof Karl Marx on concentration is definitelyproved; true, this applies to a country whereindustry is protected by tariffs and freightrates. The German mining industry isripe for expropriation”[2] (278-79). (Theconcluding words of Chapter 5 in the book.) | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | | | | | | N.B. | | |

See p. 108.

Heymann’s statistics:

Twenty-four combined enterprises (these 24 include—Krupp, Stumm, Deutscher Kaiser (Thyssen), Avmetz Friede, etc., etc., all “leaders”).

Growth of large-scale production in the German iron industry

End of extracts from Heymann.

End.

Notes

[1] Ibid., pp. 227-28.—Ed.

[2] See present edition, Vol. 22 pp. 198-99.—Ed.