Jasper County Democrat, Volume 13, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 June 1910 — TARIFFS AND WAGES [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

TARIFFS AND WAGES

Protection of No Benefit to the American Worker FALLACIOUS IDEA EXPLODED. High Protection and Low Wage* Pre* vail |ln the Cotton Industry—Manufacturers Make 16 Per Cent and Pay Employees $7.50 a Week. Many good people think that it is the protectionist policy that keeps .American wages high. The workman mmseif gem'raily thinks so.’ He votes ;■>! <i high tariff to enable his employ•r to make high profits so that his i,i|>i<>yer v-gtj pay him high wages, knows as a consumer be will have > pay lugii prices. • bill lie thinks his : v will more than offset that'' -Imu.d do a little thinking It is • t the tariff that keeps (he American < .-..hs, high, assuming that they are iriu It is America s boundless nat,r; i ppportitnities that -have kept them nigh, and this was true when there was ho tariff or only a low tariff. Where there are most natural resources of potential weal; !> and where men are’ relatively scarce wages will go up Supply and demand settle that. Instead of the tariff l:eei>ing Amer-

ican wages r.igh. it is the American standard of wages fixed by natural Conditions that cotnjiels the tariff protected hid us t t ies to | >ay high wages. The protected industries have to compete with the nonprotected industries, and the latter employ many times more men •than the former, so that it is the wages paid in the larger group that determines the wages paid in the smaller group. Wide and farreaehing as is our tariff system, it will be found that the number of people employed in our protected industries after all bears a small ’proportion to those employed in the industries that, are not protected. Professor J. Laurence Laughlin miiny years ago put the ratio as not more than one to sixteen, and it is not likely to be more today. In La Follette’s 'Weekly, a true friend of the workers, though sometimes misguided, we recently read the statement that the tariff “is a tax to which the people have consented mi order to maintain in .this country high wages and a high standard of living-.” Another statement was that She tar-iff-enhanced prices- charged by the manufacturer were “a" trust fund for the benefit of American labor." Elsewhere in the paper it is forcibly shown how shamefully the trustees have abused this •■trust." For instance, according to the census, of manufactures for 1905. 310.458 cotton mill operatives were paid $94,377.696 in wages, an average of $304 for

each employee, or less than $6 per week. Bulletin 62 of the census office shows that at the census for 1905 . the wages Of 202.211 cotton mill operatives averaged only $7.71 per week for rpen, $6.03 for women. “In the great cotton miffs of New England,” say* La Follette’s, “the average earnings of all operatives was less th(tn $7.50 per week.” Now. before going any further let us ask this question: Is it the 50 percent I protection which cotton goods enjoy ! that enables the cotton manufacturers .to pay these magnificent wages? Let j the reader think of the wages paid in ; industries that have no protection at ■ all “ and compare them with the.se wages and then ask himself if it can be true that It is the high tariff that keeps up the rate of wages in this country. He will see that it is not true. It is a monstrous delusion. The I tariff protected manufacturers pay the i wages which competition determines, and this competition comes from the nonprotected industries, which. after all. are the great majority. The manufacturers pay no more than they can help, tariff or no tariff. Of course, there is no doubt of the ability of the cotton spinners to pay much higher wages than they do. La Follette’s states on excellent authority that—- “ The average annual dividend paid by the mills of this group (of eighteen New England cotton mills) fdr the previous eight years, through good times and bad times, was nearly 16 per cent. * * * Thirty, mills of Fall River. Mass., paid for fourteen years dividends that r veraged 8.29 per cent annually and in addition accumulated % surplus equal to 22 per cent of their total capital.” If there were no tariff at all or only a low tariff the cotton manufacturers would be forced by competition to pay about the same wages they are paying now. The tariff on goods is no protection to labor. A tariff on imported labor might be. How the workman can still think that he is protected by admitting foreign labor free and keeping out foreign goods is a mystery. THOMAS SCANLON;

Teacher Taft—Now. there are good trusts and bad,trusts. All of you wbq are good trusts hold up your hands! (Notice the unanimity with which the hand are up It—Baltimore sun.