The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1886-02-02
CURRENCY AND WAGES.

Senator Beck said in his recent speech III
the Senate that the unlimited coinage of the
short-weight dollar would promote the best
interests of the toiling millions, and one oil
the fayorite arguments of advocates Of cheap
money has always been that it would dement,
the wage worker. Gold, the GreenbacKers
used to say, was the money of the rlch man
In a speech to the Massachusetts Club last
Saturday, Mr.. Joseph H. Walker considered
this argument and showed its fallacy In a
most effective manner. He proved concur
sively that instead Of cheap money being
benefit to the wage Worker, the wage
worker really suffered more by reason Of it
than any other class. This has been demon
strated frequently before, but never more
strikingly than by Mr.. Walker. Taking the
year 1860 as the standard when wages and
industries were in a normal condition, he
showed that the wage worker actually re-
ceiyed more for his work than he
did in any year of the war, though
war times were regarded as flush times.
Nominally he received more dollars during
the war, but their purchasing power had SO
diminished that they would buy less Of
the necessaries of life than the fewer dol
lars he received before the war Take this
Illustration: The wages of dyer III 1860
were 81 cents per day. In 1864 they were 81
per day. But the purchasing power OF the
dollar he received in the latter year was only
one half as much as the dollar he received IN
the former year, so that in 1864 he actually
received only 80 cents day. His real
wages in 1864 were therefore one quarter less
than his wages in 1860. In 1865 his nom
inal wages were $1.2O per day, equal to 6S
cents in 1860. Take another Illustration
In 1860 the wages of plain weaVers were y
cents per day, and in 1864 $1.0S per day, but
the latter sum would buy only what 30 cents
would buy in 1860. Their real wages were
one quarter less, and with the exception Of
one year, it was eighteen years before
their wages amounted to as much as in 1860
During that time their real wages averaged
$50 cents per day while they lost the value OF
597 Id days wages, or about $3.50 The real
wages of locomotive engineers were two
ffths less in 1864 than in 1860, though their
nominal wages were more than one-eighth
more. In nineteen of the leading industries
Mr.. Walker finds that the average days
wages lost to each operative by reason OF
the depreciation of the currency was 331
$40 days, or about one year and one-tenth.
Taking the country over and reckoning five
persons to a family, gives 100000 families.
Assuming that the earnings of each family
are $3.50 year of 800 days, shows that the
loss to the wage workers Of the country by
the depreciation of the currency was $780,
100000 sum equal to the public debt on
Aug. 81, 1865, its highest point, and nearly
double the present national debt.
What happened during the war will surely
happen again whenever our currency be-
comes deprecated. If the stream OF silver
dollars drives out gold, as it inevitably will
if continued long enough, then the purchas-
ing power of the silver dollar will diminish
and the wage worker will be the first to
feel the depreciation and the one least able
to protect himself against it. OF course
silver will not depreciate to so great an eX-
tent as the paper dollar, because it has in
trinsic value, SO that the wage worker viii
not be affected to so great an extent as
during the war. But he will suffer, never
theless, and seriously.