Jasper County Democrat, Volume 2, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 November 1899 — Labor worle [ARTICLE]

Labor World

The typewriter employs 500,000 women. There are 2,300 central station plants for generating electricity In the United States. A trade paper mentions that another new molding machine has been perfected, by the operation of which three men can do the work of some sixty odd mechanics. The Glasgow town council Tas awarded a contract for two electric traction engines to an American company solely on the ground of an earlier delivery than could be promised in Great Britain. It is' another Atbara bridge case. The gross daily value of manufactured goods in the Pittsburg district alone, it Is claimed, at present exceeds $6,000,000. Two hundred and seventy thousand men are employed within a radius of ten miles of the city hall, principally in the iron, steel, glass and coal Industries. The iron situation throughout the South, because of the unprecedented demand, is serious. Many furnaces in the Tennessee and Alabama districts are sold so far ahead that it is impossible for foundry men and smaller consumers to obtain iron from them at any figure. Most of the furnaces have orders sufficient to consume their full production far into next year. Corporation workmen on the Berlin (Prussia) sewage farms are called upon to work 17 hours a day at a rate of 11 marks a week. Women workers are employed at 7% pfennings, and for six hours’ work children are paid 3 pfennigs. The buildings in which these workers are compelled to live are described as mere hovels, unfit for human beings. Under the circumstances the imperial attitude toward trades unionism becomes intelligible. More than 500,000 textile operatives throughout the United States and Canada will be beneficially affected If the proposed steps toward a federation of the national bodies are carried out. Representatives from the National Carders’ Union, National Loomfixers’ -Association, National Federation of Textile Operatives, National Association of Mule Spinners, National Union of Textile Workers and the National Slashers’ Association met recently in Boston, and definite action was taken toward perfecting a national federation.