"Greatest Tax"

The publication of income taxes brought out some interesting facts about corporations as well as about individuals. The greatest single tax paid by any one industrial organization was $15,930,901--the 1923 income tax of the U. S. Steel Corporation. The similar tax paid by the Ford Motor Co. the same year was $14,449,673. The Ford Co. started with a capitalization of only $100,000, of which only $28,000 was in actual cash. The Steel Corporation, on the other hand, started with a capitalization of over a billion, including bonds. Today, the Ford Co. has no bonds, while U. S. Steel has many millions in outstanding bonds. Ford Co. is capitalized at $17,264,500, compared with $868,583,600 of capital stock for U. S. Steel. The latter's assets were listed at $2,420,882,704, while those of the Ford Co. were given 5,101,639. Steel's working capital was $451,192,447; Ford's was $257,295,916. The Steel Corporation has 147 steel works, 123 blast furnaces, 331 open hearth and electric furnaces, and 157 sheet jobbing and plate mills; the Ford plants are 34 in number, and are located all over the world.