The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1872-05-23
Out of Work.

Out of Work.
Everywhere we hear this complaint,
but it is generally from PERSONS who
have no settled occupation in life, or,
next to none, follow some precarlous
clerkship. Or, if it is of those VINO e.
deavor to follow a mechanical trade,
they are persons who are not cup" in
their calling. Workmen of any handi-
craft who are masters of their business
seldom want for work. But the number
of miserable clerks no other. words
will express the subiect-out of employ
ment to-day in New York, Boston, Phil
adelphia, Brooklyn, Baltimore, Chicago,
and other great cities of the land, is not
only lamentable, but enormous. Mer-
chants, bankers and business men of all
kinds-more especially those who labor
under a reputation for benevolence-
are inundated by applications from per-
sons thoroughly deserving, who are re-
duced to the most desperate straits for a
bare subsistence.
Only few days ago, gentleman dis
covered, in the conductor of the car In
which he was travelling, an old ac-
quaintance, formerly a clerk with
salary of three thousand dollars, who
was thankful to have even his present
employment. Nor is he the only one
of this class so engaged. The evil is,
moreover, an increasing one. aud people
would do well seriously to bethink them
selves of remedy. Even clerks who do
get work have, ordinarily, so poor a
future before them, that the fascination
this employment has can only be ac-
counted for by absurd notions of its
"genti!ity.' If persons had rather
starve in "genteel" manner than
take off coat deterlninedly, and go to
work, why it is their own affair, we sup
pose. But it is time peoples eyes were
opened to the enormity of the evils they
generate by crowding the unproducing
ranks of life, and letting the producing
go untitled.
There is great demand for men, for
workers, but the market for drones, for
loafers, is always full. People of sense
have about arrived at the conclusion, in
plain language, that "any fool can be
clerk" while to be an efficient cabinet
maker requires qualities by no means so
easily found. The result is that the
supply of the clerk class is enormously
| in excess of the demand, and as nat
ural consequence, their salaries can be
screwed down to the very lowest limits,
and this fact the capitalist is generally
at no great hesitation to improve upon.
Not only is the number of clerks kept
far above the demand by the hosts strug-
Cling for admittance to its "honors !"
who think it is more "genteel" than
manual labor, and by the influx of fe-
male labor that is setting in that direc-
ton, but the business is often perpetual
ted from father to son. Boys are put
into the ranks of clerkship who are en-
tirely untitled for service there. A
the head of a house in which he is him
self employed, solicits place for his
son, and congratulates himself on having
by so doing contributed at least six dol
lars week more to the scanty resources
of home. Were he TO reflect that he is,
in all probability, condemning the lad
to the chronic impecuniosity under which
he himself groans, he would be less de-
lighted. These children should be kept
in view, and their real interests cared
for. They should be rescued from that
most miserable of all lives, the constant
struggle to maintain appearances; the
shabby shifts and mean devices to appear
something which they are not. This is
real poverty.
This, too, is what makes the carpenter
or the shoemaker, albeit his actual gains
in money may be the same, SO far richer
a man than the clerk. He has a good
fire, plenty TO eat, and warm clothes
His wife cooks the chops, and does the
washing, and doesn't care who knows
that she does it; and their means amply
suffice for life which is perfectly nat
ural, genuine, and above-board in every
respect. And the West beckons to peo-
pie who might otherwise fritter away
their lives at home in the bondage OF
clerkships. We have boundless terri
tory to be developed, virgin soil to be
upturned, and lan2s which will grow
yearly in value, to be obtained ON the
easiest terms. There arc men in the
Western States who had the courage, in
early life, to leave the counters of Chica-
go and st, Louis to rough it in Cali,
fornia and Colorado. They bought land
for cents which is now worth thousand:
of dollars. They dug the ground which
Denver and Sacramento now cover
Their vigor and physique is certainly a.
good to-day as that of their fellow
clerks, whom, at nineteen, they left a
the desk, while they have more dollar
than the Others have cents.