The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1879-07-21
Mr.. Edward AtkinSOn'S Essay on
Labor and Capital.
NOVELS AND CHIT-CHAT.
Books for the Student and the
Summer Saunterer.

son, of Boston. well known as one of the cleares
and most original thinkers among American political
economists, and a writer whose practical ac
quaintance with the intricate details of the
relations OF labor and capital comes from
the fact that he has long been success.
fully engaged in cotton spinning. The little book
before us. which can be procured for twenty cents
and is Ineligible to any reader of moderate powers
is clear demonstration of several important facts :
First-That the gains of capitalists in legitimate
business made almost altogether not at the cost
OF the public but by the savings economies which
they introduce from which the public is the great
est gamer To illustrate this he the of the
late Mr.. Vanderbilt
The great exemplar Of obnoxious wealth. against
whom the demagogue and the sentimentalist aim
their complaints OF wrong done and injustice suffered
in the distribution OF wealth, was the great railway
owner and operator who lately controlled the New
York Central Railroad aud its connections. He ac-
cumulated n colossal fortune in u single generation,
which may possibly be held by his posterity tor two
three generations but when We examine the
method of his accumulation We lind that 1t repre-
scented only small share OF the labor that he saved
men from doing, and not that he either COM
PEELED could compel them to do He was a great
nutomatou, whose law OF being was to work with
such effect that he reduced the cost or moving
year subsistence OF Western flour and meat thou
sand miles to the measure OF one days work OF
common laborer in Massachusetts. Five hundred
pounds of meat and hour-a quarter OF ton-con-
stitutes tair allowance OF the product Of the West
ern prairie for years subsistence OF workman OF
MASgach uSettS, ana THIS quantity ne moved l,UUO
miles for II rs. and sometimes for less. He abol-
ished distance ut the cost OF his small accretion of
wealth; which accreto ntcompared to the work that
he did, would be like comparing the work that
drop of water will do by its falling weight compared
to the power it will exert when expanded INTO steam
and directed against the piston OF engine. His
fortune but trihing share of the labor that
the men OF Mas sachusetts and other Eastern States
have been saved by the application OF that single
piece of capital the railway which he controlled to
the mere mechanical work Of distributing the prod
ucts OF the great West.
Again he writes
The modern cotton factory seems to some men
like great mechanical ogre. grinding wealth out OF
the blood and bones of its operatives. But what il
its true functlon? hundred years ago, when
ancestors clothed mainly in homespun fabrics,
the arduous labor of at least person in every
family of five six must have been absolutely
needed to spin and weave by hand the fabrics
CURED for the scanty clothing of the people; now
one person in each two hundred or two hundred
and NIT only need work i'll the factory to produce
the cotton and woollen fabrics that constitute the
garments OF the most amply clothed nation OF the
world. 1t may be hard life in factory; but if 1t
is hardship. compared the life which the oper-
aives have LETT to engage in it, why have they
oft? Why do the masses OF the French Canadians
move to compete tor the work. and leave their little
strips OF land the st. Lawrence, to which they
seem to have been bound i'll unprogressive drudgery
for two centuries and crowd our factory villages.
establishing themselves permanently, buying viii
lage lots, building better houses and pic
turesque ones than the Irish who Immediately
preceued them while the Irish themselves have
passed through the factories take up the deserted
farms of New England, on which, by their persis-
tent industry. they get subsistence where modern
Yankee would starveY 1t may be true that both
overwork their children to extent, but let
it be considered where the children of the Irish
cotter and the Canadian peasant would have been
had not the factories OF New England been opened
to them before the limited factory labor Of
these children is utterly condemned.
Second-Mr. Atkinson shows that. taking manu- cac-
tures all kinds Massachusetts, the value of the
annual product in normal times Is twice the capital
invested in them. Thus. by the State census of
hat tnta nj inv
manufactures in Massachusetts, was S267. 900, 0Oo
and the product OF year $500 600 900. But he
adds capitalists will readily embark their money in
any manufacture which will yield them ten per
cent the investment, and which would be
equal to five per cent of the product,
and 1t follows that the whole remainder
ninety-fve per cent OF the total production-is
divided among laborers. who either furnish the raw
material or make the finished article But he adds
pertinently. that the supposed five per cent,
ofener but three which is the capitalists share Of
the total production he does not after all keep. OF
that also great share is further distributed among
laborers who supply him and his family grocers.
butchers, tailors, gardeners and servants. Taking
the whole cotton industry of the country he shows
that its gross value roughly about sl25 per
annum, of which but eight and half per cent aual
70 four and quarter per cent the Investment, is
the share of the capitalist the whole of the vast re-
mander. excepting insurance and taxes, being SUBJ
stantally divided among laborers He continues:
The value OF the cotton used North is distributed
among not less than 100000 people in the South,
mainly those who work the crop and i'll small part
those who move It.
The labor cost OF the cloth is absorbed in small
degree by the few masters of the spinning and
weaving who control and direct the complex forces
and machinery by which the work is done but
mainly by 10000 to 10000 men, women aud chill
dren who attend the pickers cards, spindles aud
looms.
The cost of fuel. oil and supplies passes to the
miners and workers, from whose work no great
fortunes are now accruing unless it be in the in
Significant item OF oil; the cost of the starch re-
CURED in weaving and not used for adulteration
passes mainly to the farmers, who annually supply
the factories aud bleacheries with the starch prod
uct OF about 25.OoO0OO bushels of potatoes their
The insurance liz mainly loss and, under the
mutual system, in very small degree expense.
The taxes are for tue common welfare.
The depreciation fund must ultimately 20 to the
mechanic, the artisan and the machinist. who
place the machines that are worn out service or
DESTROYED by INVENTION
A large share OF the cost Of distribution
must be expended in railway service among
railway employees aud among clerks, por-
tiers and draymen. or be absorbed by actual losses
that cannot be avoided. large share both of the
commissions of the merchants on the distribution
and OF the assumed profit the business itself must
again OF necessity be distributed among the trades
men who supply the households. and the domestic
servants who serve the families of the merchants
and of the owners of the mills.
1T follows. he rightly concludes, "that IL there
Is TO DO a general division of property, IL must
be at the ninetyseven per cent Of production which
labor gets, for the three per cent left for capital is
too trifing, and is absolutely needed for new ma
,hinery to serve new demands" The problem be-
fore us as people he states thus: -
How stimulate the consumption of the
excess OF production of every substance needed for
material weliarey Ii we limit consideration to
those things that are cassed as articles of neces-
sHy-cotton, meat corn and wheat iron. copper,
lead and staple goods and wares OF all kinds-our
means OF production are beyond the possible con-
sumption of our own people, even II all had enough
for comfortable subsistence. In respect to the
home consumption of our commodities the problem
therefore IL, How can the people distribute them
selves that a better mode OF life can be enjoyed
than they ever had before, compassed by shorter
hours and less arduous labor, with more general
leisure and wider distribution OF common comfort
and even uxuryf Ia respect to foreign consump-
ton. the question in regard to many Of our com
rnodities Is not the labor coet of producton--ma-
cbinory has made good wage earnings sistent
with very low cOst-but rather how we reac Ia
the people OF other countries where carcity still