The second major policy I desire to lay before you has to do with the
growing concentration of economic power and the threat to free competitive
private enterprise. In 1941 the Temporary National Economic Committee
completed a comprehensive investigation into the workings of the national
economy. The Committee's study showed that, despite a half century of
anti-trust law enforcement, one of the gravest threats to our welfare lay
in the increasing concentration of power in the hands of a small number of
giant organizations.
During the war, this long-standing tendency toward economic concentration
was accelerated. As a consequence, we now find that to a greater extent
than ever before, whole industries are dominated by one or a few large
organizations which can restrict production in the interest of higher
profits and thus reduce employment and purchasing power.
In an effort to assure full opportunity and free competition to business we
will vigorously enforce the anti-trust laws. There is much the Congress can
do to cooperate and assist in this program.
To strengthen and enforce the laws that regulate business practices is not
enough. Enforcement must be supplemented by positive measures of aid to new
enterprises. Government assistance, research programs, and credit powers
should be designed and used to promote the growth of new firms and new
industries. Assistance to small business is particularly important at this
time when thousands of veterans who are potential business and industrial
leaders are beginning their careers.
We should also give special attention to the decentralization of industry
and the development of areas that are now under-industrialized.