See A Nail, Don't Pick It Up

Mr. William Garrett made recently the statement that wire nails are uow sold socheaply that if a carpenter drops a, nail it is cheaper to let it lie than to stoop and piek it up, and it is claimed that one keg out of five is never used, but goes to waste. A statistician fignring this out, and assuming that it takes a carpenter ten seoonds to piek op a nail, and that his time is worth 30 cents an bour, remarks that the recovery of the nail he has dropped would cost . 083 cents. The money value of the nail is .0077 cents - that is, it would not pay to piek up ten nails if it tnok ten seconds of time worth 30 cents au hour. Ordinary men who are not very quick can, however, piek up a nail on a moderately cleau fioor in five seconds. Assuming that this is abetter average than the ten seconds, and that we are paying the carpenter only 25 cents an honr, it will still co.st to recover tliu uail .0347 cents, wbicfa is nearly five times the value of an individual nail. ïhere is therefore a considerable factor of safety in the original calonlation, and we are bound to believe that it will not pay to pickupuails. Such a calculation brings out clearly the marvelous reduction in prices duo to inveutive genins. The lurking fallacy is that while it may not pay to stoop for each nail it still niay be worth while for an economical inan at the end of his work to stoop down once and sweep up in a single handfnl the nails he has been drormincr all dav.