GET-RICH-QUICK PLAN

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXV, Issue 160, 22 June 1935, Page 11

GET-RICH-QUICK PLAN

Chain Letters in United States

LIKE ‘‘PROSPERITY CLUB”

The '‘lnternational Prosperity Club' s ” chain - letter scheme, whereby members in the chain, it is said, will receive £7BO for the investment of 1/-, was referred to in these columns yesterday, and the opinion was expressed that the chain had evidently been started by a group of Wellington “prosperity hunters,’’ but according to American exchanges the scheme, where it is called the “Send-a-Dime’’ system, has been in operation in the United States for some considerable time, and, in fact, it has now developed into a “racket.”

In spite of the action of the Post Office authorities in trying to stamp it out, America’s “Send-a-Dime” craze shows no signs of abating, says a New Y'ork correspondent. Instead, the business has become so profitable that the racketeers have entered it, and are fleecing the more gullible members of the public. Already numerous arreetg have been made in the Middle West.

The procedure is simple. The chain letter —and there are literally millions of them now circulating—asks the receiver to copy it and send the copies to five friends, who, in turn, must send other copies to five friends. In the letter is a list of names. The receiver of a letter places his name at the bottom of the list, and sends one dime to the name and address of the person at the top of the list, crossing off that name.

The writer’s name is thus supposed to work its way up from the bottom to the top of the list, and the number of letters thus containing his name is multiplied to the sixth power of five, or 15,625. Then the 15,625 persons are expected to send a dime each, or 1562 dollars and twenty cents (approximately £312). Several people claim that they had received from ten dollars (£2) to i()0 dollars (£2O) in a few days. Although the fallacy of the scheme is obvious—namely, that the more it extends the more people will be paying out money to one another, and spending money on postage stamps to do it —it has swept like wildfire through the country. In Oklahoma, chains in which the minimum contribution is one dollar (4/-), have been started, while in Wisconsin the stake is as high as 10 dollars (£2). At some centres in the West the postal authorities have been overwhelmed by the number of letters. In the States of Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Arkansas racketeers have opened offices and started one, two, and three-dollar chains. They promise to collect and deliver the letters themselves, acting as a sort of clearinghouse, and thus save the senders money. Needless to say, anybody who believes them, and there are thousands who do, saves money on postage but loses his original stake.