[bluGill]

You are confusing what the business leaders of today think with what they thought in the 1920s. In the 1920s and before nobody could think of a reason why large inventories would be bad: they were a buffer against surges in demand, and you got to build them at today's prices. A large inventory just meant you need to hire more salesmen (literally men, it was a sexist time), and/or hold a sale.

Of course now management theory knows of many reasons the above is wrong, it is entirely accepted that you want inventories low because of the advantages it brings.

[kgwgk]

The article is talking about the 80’s, not the 20’s. The importance of working capital management was well understood by then.

[bluGill]

In the 1980s it was well understood in universities. However senior management in real companies were catching up. Some companies understood at and were executing well (mostly Japanese companies who started early). other companies had figured out how important it was, but were still trying to figure out how to apply it. Other companies were just waking up to the fact that their competition doing something else was beating them, without knowing why.

[bsder]

> it is entirely accepted that you want inventories low because of the advantages it brings.

Advantages ... until you have an earthquake in Taiwan and the entire semiconductor industry shuts down because nobody has any inventory ...