Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 March 1891 — PROTECTION EXPOSED. [ARTICLE]

PROTECTION EXPOSED.

THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF THE PAUPER LABOR CRY. K«port of Labor Commissioner Wright—•tool and Iron Making in Europe and the United States—Cold Facts About l’auper Labor—A Pitiless Arraignment of Protection. Col. Carroll D. Wright, United States Labor Commissioner, has sent to Congress the most important report yet grade by him. The subject of this report is the cost of production of iron and steel in their various forms, both in this country and in Europe. The efficiency of labor here and in Europe is also the subject of investigation, as well as the cost of living among laborers engaged in the various forms of the iron and steel industries. This investigation is pursued in an absolutely non-partisan spirit. For this reason the facts brought out in the.report are all the more damaging to the cause of high protection. The mass of facts and figures given by Col. Wright may be regarded as absolutely trustworthy and authoritative; and there can be no doubt that this report will play' an important part in future discussions of the tariff. Its arsenal of facts will be used to meet the cheap talk of the protectionists about the pauper labor of Europe, and to refute their claim that the cost of production is so much less in Europe than to us as to make McKinley’s high duties necessary for the protection of the American iron and steel industry. The figures given by Colonel Wright were taken in every case fiom the books of the manufacturers and mine operators, and may be accepted implicitly. The report does not cover all the companies engaged in mining ore, making pig-iron, and manufacturing steel rails and other forms of steel. Naturally there was a disposition on the part of some to keep secret their methods of business and their profits. Thus tho report contains information about only two American steel rail establishments, the eleven others reported being European. The other rail manufacturers here “showed a sensitiveness about giving information.” The report contains information about 618 establishments in this country and in Europe which are engaged in the various forms of iron and steel manufacture, and it required tho labor of three years to collect the information embraced in it The cost of making pig-iron is examined in detail in 118 separate establishments. In tho following table the cost of materials, of labor, and the total cost of ipaking one ton of pig-iron in eleven establishments in Europe and e even in tho United States is given. The cost of materials includes, of course, all the iron ore, coke, coal and limestone as laid down at the furnace; and the column headed “labor” gives simply the cost of converting the ore into pig-iron. The establishments here quoted represent fairly the highest, lowest, and average cost in each case. Cost ot Total Locality. Materials. Labor. Cost. Northern 5tate5....*17.728 $3,589 $23,165 Northern States.... 13.233 1.191 15.202 Northern States.... 11.991 .975 13.584 Northern States.... 11.663 1.364 13.433 Northern States.... 12.267 2.135 15.278 Northern States.... 11.147 1.166 12.820 Southern States.... 7.757 1.461 10.279 Southern States.... 7.173 1.816 9.634 Southern States.... 7.202 2.608 10.267 Southern States.... 8.877 1.218 10.822 Southern States.... 8.164 .695 9.623 Great Britain 9.230 .601 10.290 Great Britain 9.308 .713 10.729 Great Britain. 6.454 .618 7.677 Great Britain 9.629 .769 10.493 Europe 9.659 .418 10.394 Europe.'. 12.228 .912 13.434 Europe 14.219 .719 15.075 Europe.. 6.785 .470 7.736 Europe 9.883 1.414 12.070 Europe 9.061 .711 11.107 Europe 7.327 . 765 8.765 The average cost of turning out pig iron at eleven American furnaces is #13.10 a ton; in the eleven European establishments the cost is $10.74, or a difference of $2.36. And this $2.36 is the basis for all the protectionist rant and twaddle about cheap European iron! To cover that slightdifferenee—less than the present freight rates from Liverpool to New York—our wise protectionist law-makers impose a duty of $6.72 a ton ou foreign pig iron. Another examination shows the entire labor cost in producing a ton of Bessemer pig iron, including the labor of mining and transporting the materials to the furnace. In five Bessemer establishments in the United States tho average labor cost of a ton of pig iron is $5.08. In one of these, however, the labor cost was abnormally high, being $9.44. Omitting this one, the average of the other four was $5.24 a ton. In tho summaries of the report thus far made public, only ono English establishment is given at which Bessemer pig iron is made. In this ono the total labor cost was $3.32 a ton, or only $1.92 a ton lower than in the four American establishments. It is a significant fact that these four American furnaces charge on an average $3.70 a ton more for Bessemer pig iron than it costs to produce it, while the English establishment contents itself with a profit of $1.73. The tariff of $6.72 a ton enables the four American producers to net $1.97 a ton more on their iron than the Englishman gets. ,Tho report also includes the figures showing the cost of producing stedi rails. The surprising result of Col. Wright’s investigation is that it actually costs less for labor, on an average, to convert steel bars into rails in the United States than in England, and considerably less than on the continent of Europe. The average for the two American establishments reported is $1.41 per ton; for the three English establishments, $1.83; for eight establishments on the continent, $2 45. As some of tho American mills refused to give information, it is highly probable that the true American labor cost is less than $1.41. . Such figures as those are the most damaging facts against protection that it is possible to imagine. They simply crush case and drive him out of court with all his rot about European cheap labor.