Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1884-10-03
Similar Causes Produce Opposite Effects,

Similar Causes Produce Opposite Effects,
To q given cause must be assigned
uniform effect, and If the effect be not
uniform, doubt is cast upon the cor
rectness OF the putative cause. And
TO say that a policy of government
which has positive and fixed result
in one country can have result the
direct opposite in another country Is
SO say that there are diverse rules of
logical sequence in the two countries,
Advocates of a protection tariff for
tify their arguments against free trade
with doleful pictures of the impover-
ished condition of the American work.
ingmen II free trade shall ever be in
troduced In this blessed land. 1t Is
free trade, they assume and assert,
which in England makes wages lower
than in the United States; and If the
system which is accepted by them as
having reduced wages in England
shall become the policy of this gov
eminent there will be a prompt and
disastrous declension of wages to the
same rate as prevails in England.
II 1t were a truth that free trade re-
duces wages to a uniform level, then
protection should raise wages to the
same uniformity. Appreciation in the
United States-according to the state
ments Of protectlonlsts-ha been the
cause of maintaining wages, then pro-
lection in Germany, If in an equal de-
gree, should put up the wages Of labor
there as high as they are here. The
German government does not, how
ever, impose an equal rate of tariff du-
ties on imports as the United States,
from which the inference Is unavoid-
able that they care less for the laboring
man in the dominions of Bismarck
than i'm the dominions of Uncle Sam;
and perhaps the want Of more tariff
accounts for the very small remunera-
ton of labor in that empire. But here
the puzzling question intervenes, what
makes wages so much higher in
England than in Germany? We
understand why the American la
borer is better paid. 1t is because he
has a higher tariff. This, though, will
not serve to explain the difference be-
tween Germany and England. II
higher tariffs make higher wages in
the United States than in Germany,
what makes wages higher in Eug-
land, which has no tariff at all? The
English artisan is the best paid
worker in Europe, and second only to
the workman Of this country in the
rate Of wages he receives. The Ger
man artisan IL, next to the Russian,
the worst paid workman in Europe.
Germany and Russia both support
high tariff systems of government,
and get all the protection that such
Eystem is capable of giving. England
gives her manufacturing operatives no
tariff protection, but pays them the
best wages.
A table recently prepared and pub-
lished by the American consul in Ber-
lin gives the average rate of wages
paid ia that city. 1t shows that stone
cutters, working twelve hours day,
are paid S4.2S a week, less than six
cents an hour. Journeymen moulders
are paid S4.09; mechanicians, S4.2s I;
wool spinners, from SOS to $6.42,
working thirteen hours day.; har-
ness makers, $500; butchers. SPA
land board) shoemakers, 1855; bar
bers, Sl.7s land board) masons, So. 80 +;
carpenters, $500; painters, So 81.
These prices of work are paid In the
city OF Berlin, and in the smaller
towns where living is cheaper wages
are lower. None of the workmen
labor less than twelve hours
a day, while thirteen hours
is q days work in many
of the trades. English workmen in
similar occupations, working eight
and ten hours day, get much better
wages.
We repeat the proposition at che be.
ginning of this article--to given
cause must be assigned uniform
effect. If protection keeps up wages
in the United States, why does it not
operate In like manner in Germany =?
To give an intelligent answer to this
question, one must confess in the be-
ginning that other and more powerful
influences than high tariff must be
sought to account for the variation of
workingmen's wages in different
cou ntries.
From Kansas to the Gulf.
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