[Will N]

Originally Posted by alexiskai

There was a similar thing with the cooking fat drives. The public perception was that the cooking fat was needed for glycerin to make ammo, but in fact the gov't had no trouble sourcing enough glycerin. Rockoff writes:
"Munitions makers operating on cost-plus contracts with the government could easily outbid rivals for what they needed. Rather, the fat salvage drive was undertaken for the soap makers who organized and financed the drive. Soap production was high during the war by prewar standards, and fat supplies were also relatively abundant, especially later in the war. By January of 1944, lard was so abundant that the government was having storage difficulties. But price controls meant that there was excess demand for soap. Early in the war (organizational meetings for the fat salvage campaign began in April 1942), soap makers feared that if soap were rationed, some of the consumers forced to cut their use of soap during the war would learn that they could do with less. Rationing, in other words, would spoil postwar markets. As far as the soap producers were concerned, anything that would avoid the need to ration soap was worth doing."

The fact that all these drives were "public-private partnerships," with the affected industry absorbing a lot of the publicity costs, gives you a different sense of whose interests were being served.

I'm told that stores used to post signs like "Ladies, bring in your fat cans on Fridays" in their windows. Used to cause a chuckle now and then.