Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 35, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 September 1891 — The Truth About Wages. [ARTICLE]

The Truth About Wages.

The position of the tariff reformers in the matter of wages and competition from European pauper labor has been all along that the greater producing power of American labor Should remove all fear of dangerous competition from Europe. They have always claimed that wherever a true comparison is made between wages in America and in Europe, a comparison of the proportion of wages in every dollar’s worth of goods, American wages will almost invariably be found lower than wages in Europe. The tariff reformers did not expect to see this fact admitted by the high tariff cranks; but now the New York Tribune, the most tariff-blinded of all protection journals, says; “It is acknowledged by foreign manufacturers and railroad men who have visited this country and carefully examined affairs here that the higher efficacy of labor secured by higher wages here to a great extent counterbalances the difference in wages paid ” If so, what need for protection? Do you not see that you have given away your case?