BUSINESS SUCCESS AND FAILURE.

Evening Post, Volume LXIV, Issue 47, 23 August 1902, Page 5 (Supplement)

BUSINESS SUCCESS AND FAILURE.

Some interesting figures have recently been published in Bradstreet's, showing the number of business failures last year in the United States, and the causes to which they are attributable. It is stated that there were 1,201,862 concerns engaged in business in 1901, and that of these 10.648 failed, or considerably less than 1 per cent, of the whole, a lower percentage than has occurred in any year since 1882, save in the year 1900. Brad/street's classifies the causes of failures under eleven heads, and gives also the number which it regards attributable to each cause. Of the "even, "lock oi capital" takes the lead as most prolific in inducing failures, those ascribed to it numbering 3323. "Incompetence" comes next on the list, and is made accountable for 2023, and then "specific conditions," by which is meant such things as strikes, the corn crop failure, the assassination of President M'Kinley, the lowered price of cotton at the South, and similar events of a disastrous tendency. To these 1765 business failures are traced. Next in number were failures arising from disposition of property," and amounting to 1154. Ihe other causes, with the number of failures resulting from them, were "inexperience," 828; "competition," 466 j "unwise granting of credits," 376 ; "neglect of Dusiness," 322 ; "failures of others," 259; "speculation," 141; "extravagance," 101. ' It is, according to Bradstreet's, to these eleven causeß that nearly all business failures can be traced, year by year. It will be noticed that ot the eleven, eight are due to some fault or faults in the man himself who fails, the chief of these being lack of capital and incompetence. Of the three remaining ones, two — namely, failures of others, that is of persons who were really solvent debtors, and special or undue competition, are not due to the man himself but to his fellowmen. Some specific conditions, such, for instance, as the corn crop failure, would be due to no human cause; while others, ouch as strikes, and the assassination of the President, were attributable to human agency. It. appears from the figures given that extravagance and speculation play a less frequent part in causing failures than is generally supposed. Incompetence, which is, perhaps, only another name for conceit, the conceit of the man who is really only fitted to .be a clerk or. em-, ployee, but who thinks himself able to be a proprietor and manager, causes more than eight times as many failures as extravagance and speculation combined. It is a good thing, as is generally done in sermons and lectures, to vram young men against speculation aud extravagant habits, but it is not a good thing to lead them to think that if they shun these they are sure to succeed in business, or even that these are the rocks upon which they are most likely to split. Suf-, ficient capital, business ability, well-sus-tained credit, and thorough attention to one's affairs, are indispensable to success, and these matters, an well as the others, should be emphasised in advice to young j men. — Rochester Post Express.