concomitant variations in de f, or whether both sets of phenomena are or are not governed by some third set, the variations of which affect simultaneously and proportionately the other two.

The moral which writers like Mr. Gunton and Mr. Schoenhof have sought to extract, and which has been accepted by not a few leaders in the "labor movement," is that every rise of wages and every shortening of hours will necessarily be followed by an equivalent or a more than equivalent rise in the efficiency of labor. In seeking to establish this position, special stress is laid upon the evidence of the comparative statistics of textile industries. But, in the first place, it must be pointed out that the evidence adduced does not sup. port any such sweeping generalization. The statistics of Mr. Gould and Mr. Schoenhof, for instance, show many cases where higher money and real wages of American operatives are not accompanied by a correspondingly larger productivity. In such cases the cheap" labor of England is really cheap.

Again, in other cases where the higher wages of American workers are accompanied by an equivalent, or more than equivalent, increase of product, that increased product is not due entirely or chiefly to greater intensity or efficiency of labor, but to the use of more highly elaborated labor-saving machinery. Here the direct labor cost of each commodity may be as little, or even less, than in England, but the total cost of production and the selling price may be higher. Lastly, in that comparison between England and America, which is in many respects the most serviceable, because the two countries are nearest in their development of industrial methods as well as in the character of their laborers, the difference of money and of real wage is not commonly accompanied by a difference in hours of labor.

The evidence we possess does not warrant any universal or even general application of the theory of the economy of high wages. If it was generally true that by increasing wages and by shorten ing working hours the daily product of each laborer could be increased or even maintained, the social problem, so far

as it relates to the alleviation of the poverty and misery of the lower grades of workers, would admit of an easy solution. But though it will be generally admitted that a rise of wages or of the general standard of comfort of most classes of workers will be followed by increased efficiency of labor, and that a shortening of hours will not be followed by a corresponding diminution in output, it by no means follows that it will be profitable to increase wages and shorten hours indefinitely. Just as it is admitted that the result of an equal shortening of hours will be different in every trade, so will the result of a given rise in standard of comfort be different. In some cases highly paid labor and short hours will pay, in other cases cheaper labor and longer hours. It is not possible by dwelling upon the concomitance of high wages and good work, low wages and bad work, in many of the most highly-developed industries to appeal to the enlightened self-interest of employers for the adoption of a general rise in wages and a general shortening of hours. Because the most profitable business may often be conducted on a system which involves high wages for short intense work with highly evolved machinery, it by no means follows that other businesses may not be more profitably conducted by employing low-paid workers for long hours with simpler machinery. We are not at liberty to conclude that the early Lancashire mill-owners adopted a short-sighted policy in employing children and feeble adult labor at starvation wages.

The evidence, in particular, of Schulze-Gävernitz certainly shows that the economy of high wages and short hours is closely linked with the development of machinery, and that when machinery is complex and capable of being worked at high pressure a net economy of high wages and short hours emerges. In this light modern machinery is seen as the direct cause of high wages and short hours. For though the object of introducing machinery is to substitute machine-tenders at low wages for skilled handicraftsmen, and though the tireless machine could be profitably worked continuously, when due regard is had to human nature it is found more profitable to work at high pressure

for shorter hours and to purchase such intense work at a higher price. It must, of course, be kept in mind that high wages are often the direct cause of the introduction of improved machinery and are an ever-present incentive to fresh mechanical inventions. This was clearly recognized half a century ago by Dr. Ure, who names the lengthened mules, the invention of the self-acting mule, and some of the early improvements in calico-printing as directly at tributable to this cause. *

But, admitting these tendencies in certain machine industries, we are not justified in relying confidently upon the ability of a rise of wages, obtained by organization of labor or otherwise, to bring about such improvements of industrial methods as will enable the higher wages to be paid without injuring the trade, or reducing the profits below the minimum socially required for the maintenance of a privately conducted industry.

Our evidence leads to the conclusion that, while a rise of wages is nearly always attended by a rise of efficiency of labor and of the product, the proportion which the increased productivity will bear to the rise of wage will differ in every employment. Hence it is not possible to make a general declaration in favor of a policy of high wages or of low

for short hours, than to pay lower wages to inferior workers such as are found in Germany, Switzerland, or even in Lancashire. But in coal-mining it appears that the American wages are economically too high-that is to say, the difference between American and English wages is not compensated by an equivalent difference of output. The gross number of tons mined by United States miners working at wages of $326 per annum is 377, yielding a cost of 864 cents per ton, as compared with 79 cents per ton, the cost of North Staffordshire coal produced by miners earning $253, and turning out 322 tons per head.* So also a ton of Bessemer pig iron costs in labor about 50 cents more in America than in England, the American wages being about 40 per cent higher.t

It is, indeed, evident from the aggregate of evidence that no determinable relation exists between cost in labor and wages for any single group of commodities.

Just as little can a general acceptance be given to the opposite contention that it is the increased efficiency of labor which causes the high wages. This is commonly the view of those business men and those economists who start from the assumption that there is some law of competition in accordance with whose operation every worker necessarily receives as much as he is worth, the full value of the product of his labor. Only by the increased efficiency of labor can wages rise, argue these people; where wages are high the efficiency of labor is found to be high, and vice versá; therefore efficiency determines wages. Just as the advocates of the economy of high-wages theory seek by means of trade-unionism, legislation, and public opinion to raise wages and shorten hours, trusting that the increased efficiency which ensues will justify such conduct, so the others insist that technical education and an elevation of the moral and industrial character of the workers must precede and justify any rise of wages or shortening of hours, by increasing the efficiency

* " No. 64 Consular Report" (quoted Schoenhof, 209).

+ Schoenhof, p. 216.

of labor. Setting aside the assumption here involved that the share of the workers in the joint product of capital and labor is a fixed and immovable proportion, this view rests upon a mere denial of the effect which it is alleged that high wages and a rise in standard of comfort have in increasing efficiency.

The relation between wages and other conditions of employment, on the one hand, and efficiency of labor or size of product on the other, is clearly one of mutual determination. Every rise in wages, leisure, and in general standard of comfort will increase the efficiency of labor; every increased efficiency, whether due directly to these or to other causes, will enable higher wages to be paid and shorter hours to be worked.

One further point emerges from the evidence relating to efficiency and high wages. According to Schulze-Gävernitz's formula, every fall in piece wages is attended by a rise in weekly wages. But it should be kept in mind that a rise in time-wages does not necessarily mean that the price of labor measured in terms of effort has been raised. Intenser labor undergone for a shorter time may obtain a higher money wage per unit of time, but the price per unit of effort may be lower. It has been recognized that a general tendency of the later evolution of machinery has been to compress and intensify labor. In certain classes of textile labor the amount of muscular or manual labor given out in a day is larger than formerly. This is the case with the work of children employed as piecers. In Ure's day (1830) he was able to claim that three-fourths of the time spent by children in the factory they had nothing to do. The increased quantity of spindles and the increased speed have made their labor more continuous. The same is true of the male spinners, whose labor, even within the last few years, has been intensified by increased size of the mule. Though as a rule machinery tends to take over the heavier forms of muscular work, it also tends to multiply the minor calls upon the muscles, until the total strain is not much less than before. What relief is obtained from muscular effort is compensated by a growing strain upon the nerves and upon the attention. Moreover as the

machinery grows more complex, numerous, and costly, the responsibility of the machine-tender is increased. To some considerable extent the new effort imposed upon the worker is of a more refined order than the heavy muscular work it has replaced. But its tax upon the physique is an ever-growing one. "A hand-loom weaver can work thirteen hours a day, but to get a six-loom weaver to work thirteen hours is a physical impossibility."* The complexity of modern machinery and the superhuman celerity of which it is capable suggest continually an increased compression of human labor, an increased output of effort per unit of time. This has been rendered possible by acquired skill and improved physique ensuing on a higher standard of living. But it is evident that where it appears that each rise in the standard of living and each shortening of the working day has been accompanied by a severer strain either upon muscles, nerves, or mental energy during the shorter working day, we are not entitled to regard the higher wages and shorter hours as clear gain for the worker. Some limits are necessarily imposed upon this compressibility of working effort. It would clearly be impossible by a number of rapid reductions of the working day and increases of time-wages to force the effectiveness of an hour's labor beyond a certain limit for the workers. Human nature must place limits upon the compression. Though it may be better for a weaver to tend four looms during the English factory day for the moderate wage of 16s. a week than to earn 11s. 8d. by tending two looms in Germany for twelve hours a day, it does not follow that it is better to earn 20s. 3d. in America by tending six, seven, or even eight looms for a ten hours day, or that the American's condition would be improved if the eight-hours day was purchased at the expense of adding another loom for each worker.

The gain which accrues from high wages and a larger amount of leisure, over which the higher consumption shall be spread, may be more than compensated by an undue strain upon the nerves or muscles during the shorter

* "Der Grossbetrieb," 167.

day. This difficulty, as we have seen, is not adequately met by assigning the heavier muscular work more and more to machinery, if the possible activity of this same machinery is made a pretext for forcing the pace of such work as devolves upon machine-tenders.

In many kinds of work, though by no means in all, an increase of the amount of work packed into an hour could be obtained by a reduction of the working day; but two considerations should act in determining the progressive movement in this direction: first, the objective economic question of the quantitative relation between the successive decrements of the working-day and the increments of labor put into each hour; second, the subjective economic question of the effect of the more compressed labor upon the worker considered both as worker and as consumer.

There is not wanting evidence to show that increased leisure and higher wages can be bought too dear.

In drawing attention to this consider ation it must not, however, be assumed that the increase of real wages and shortening of hours traced in progressive industries are necessarily accompanied by a corresponding increase in the compression of labor. In the textile and iron industries, for example, it is evident (pace Karl Marx) that the operatives have obtained some portion of the increased productivity of improved machinery in a rise of wages. Even where more machinery is tended we are not entitled to assume a correspondent increase in felt effort or strain upon the worker. A real growth of skill or efficiency will enable an increased amount of machinery to be tended with no greater effort than a smaller amount formerly required. But, while allowance should be made for this, the history of the factory system, both in England and in other countries, clearly indicates that factory labor is more intense than formerly, not, perhaps, in its tax upon the muscles, but in the growing strain it imposes upon the nervous system of the operatives.

The importance of this point is frequently ignored alike by advocates of a shorter working-day and by those who insist that the chief aim of workers

should be to make their labor more productive. So far as the higher efficiency simply means more skill and involves no increased effort it is pure gain, but where increased effort is required the question is one requiring close and detailed consideration.

Another effect of overcompressed labor deserves a word.

The close relation between higher wages and shorter hours is generally acknowledged. A rise of money wages which affects the standard of living by introducing such changes in consumption as require for their full yield of benefit or satisfaction an increase of consuming-time can only be made effective by a diminution in the producing time or hours of labor. When, for example, the new wants, whose satisfaction would be naturally sought from a rise of the standard of living, are of an intellectual order, involving not merely the purchase of books, etc., but the time to read such books, this benefit requires that the higher wages should be supplemented by a diminution in the hours of labor in cases where the latter are unduly long. But it is not so clearly recognized that such questions cannot be determined without reference to the question of intensity of labor. Yet it is evident that an eight-hours day of more compressed labor might be of a more exhausting character than a tenhours day of less intense labor and disqualify a worker from receiving the benefits of the opportunities of education open to him more than the longer hours of less intense labor. The advantage of the addition of two hours of leisure might be outweighed by the diminished value attached to each leisure-hour. In other words, the excess of intense work might be worse in its effects than the excess of more extended work. This possibility is often overlooked in the arguments of those who support the movement toward a shorter working day by maintaining that each unit of labortime will be more productive. When the argument concerns itself merely with alleging the influence of higher wages, without shorter hours, upon the efficiency of labor this neglect of the consideration of intenser labor has a more urgent importance. It may be gravely doubted whether the benefit of

the higher wages of the Massachusetts weavers is not overbalanced by the increased effort of tending so large a number of machines for hours which are longer than the English factory day. The exhausting character of such labor is likely to leave its mark in diminishing the real utility or satisfaction of the nominally higher standard of living which the high wages render possible. Where the increased productivity of labor is largely due to the improved machinery and methods of production which are stimulated by high wages without a corresponding intensification of the labor itself, the gain to labor is clear. But the possibility that short hours and high wages may stimulate an injurious compression of the output of productive effort is one which must not be overlooked in considering the influence of new industrial methods upon labor.

Duration of labor, intensity of labor, and wages, in their mutual relations, must be studied together in any attempt to estimate the tendencies of capitalist production. Nor can we expect their relations to be the same in any two industries. Where labor is thinly extended over an inordinately long working-day, as in the Indian mills, it is probable that such improvements of organization as might shorten the hours to those of an ordinary English factory day, and intensify the labor, would be a benefit, and the rise of wages which might follow would bring a double gain to the workers. But any endeavor to further shorten and intensify the working-day might injure the workers, even though their output were increased. Such an instance, however, may serve well to bring home the relativity which is involved in all such questions. The net benefit derived from a particular quantitative relation between hours of labor, intensity, and earnings would probably be widely different for English and for Indian textile workers. It would, a priori, be unreasonable to expect that the working day which would bring the greatest net advantage to both should be of the same duration. So also it may well be possible that the more energetic nervous temperament of the American operative may qualify him or her for a shorter and intenser work

ing-day than would suit the Lancashire operative. It is the inseparable relation of the three factors-duration, intensity, and earnings-which is the important point. But in considering earnings, not merely the money wage, nor even the purchasing power of the money, but the net advantage which can be obtained by consuming what is purchased must be understood, if we are to take a scientific view of the question.

It should be clearly recognized that in the consideration of all practical reforms affecting the conditions of labor, the "wages" question cannot be dissociated from the "hours" question, nor both from the "intensity of labor" question; and that any endeavor to simplify discussion, or to facilitate "labor movements," by seeking a separate solution for each is futile, because it is unscientific. When any industrial change is contemplated, it should be regarded, from the " labor" point of view, in its influence upon the net welfare of the workers, due regard being given, not merely to its effect upon wage, hours, and intensity, but upon the complex and changing relations which subsist in each trade, in each county, and in each stage of industrial development between the three.

But, although, when we bear in mind the effects of machinery in imparting intensity and monotony to labor, in increasing the number of workers engaged in sedentary indoor occupations, and in compelling an even larger proportion of the working population to live in crowded and unhealthy towns, the net benefit of machinery to the working classes may be questioned, the growth of machinery has been clearly attended by an improved standard of material comfort among the machine-workers, taking the objective measurement of comfort.

Whatever allowance may be made for the effects of increased intensity of labor, and the indirect influences of machinery, the bulk of evidence clearly indicates that machine-tenders are better fed, clothed, and housed than the hand-workers whose place they take, and that every increase in the efficiency and complexity of machinery is attended by a rise in real wages. The best