he
workers in this class of occupations and for those in the skilled
trades, is that more attention be given to adequate training, that
more facilities be offered and that a more sympathetic attitude be
shown them in their efforts for better pay and better positions.

In reviewing the Negro's business operations judgment should be
tempered by consideration of his past and of the tremendous odds of
the present. There are handicaps due to the denial of the chances of
getting experience, to inefficiency born of resulting inexperience,
to the difficulty of securing capital and building credit and to the
low purchasing power of the patronage to which a prejudiced public
limits him. He is not only denied experience, sorely limited in
capital and curtailed in credit, but his opportunities for securing
either are very meagre. In spite of all this, there has been progress
which is prophetic of the future.

From the days of slavery Negroes have tried the fortunes of the market
place and under freedom their enterprises have increased in number and
variety. At the present time Southern-born and West Indian Negroes
form the bulk of the business men, the latter far in excess of their
proportion in the Negro population. This success of West Indians is
partly a result of training and initiative developed in a more
favorable environment, as they had the benefit of whatever
opportunities their West Indian surroundings offered.

Although they gained the meagre capital chiefly from domestic and
personal service occupations, Negroes have entered and maintained a
foothold in a number of lines of business unrelated to these previous
occupations. One of the most important findings is that Negroes form
few partnerships and that those formed are rarely of more than two
persons. Co-operative or corporate business enterprises are the
exceptions. This fact has its most telling effect in preventing
accumulations of capital for large undertakings. But co-operation in
business is largely a matter of ability born of experience and where
can Negroes get this experience in well-organized firms, under
experienced supervision? For it is more than a matter of school
instruction in book-keeping and the like. In practically the entire
metropolis, they rarely get beyond the position of porter, or some
similar job. Some fair-minded white people who wish to help the Negro
help himself could do great service for the economic advancement of
the Negro by throwi