The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1886-12-08

percentage Of labor-e in the product. But,
other things being equal, the lowest percentage
OF labor-cost in any product is the guaranty
that competition is outstripped. Proteetionists
nave done service TO humanity by insisting
upon the fact that we pay to labor the highest
wages IN the world. While debate has been
gong on whether our high wages were because
OF taxation or despite taxation, economists
nave discovered and demonstrated the cor
relative fact that labor cost in our products 10
the least in the world.
Were trade as free with and within all the
ununited states Of Europe as II is among the
United States Of America, the great surplus
/ products OF our industry, including the man
ufactured, would have the pick of foreign mar
kets for the reason that our labor, being the
most highly paid and insuring lowest per-
eentage Of labor-cost. would everywhere
surpass rivalry. Great Britain would
follow next, for next 10 our labor
hers is the highest paid, therefore the most
efficient, and therefore next in efeeting allow
percentage Of labor cost in her chief products.
France and Germany would follow next and
command the next unsupplied markets, and
last Of ALL at the foot Of the list, quite unable
to compete with a single rival in whatever that
rival chose 10 produce, would come the pau
per labor" Of Europe and Asia. Ihe low
wages of pauper labor signify least efficiency,
which is but another name for highest per-
centage Of labor cost in the product. Other
things being equal, it is obvious that high
| wages can never be paid unless Il Is profitable
to pay them, and il can only be a good busi-
ness to pay the highest wages. because the
| efficiency Of those who earn them vindicates
its superiority by the reduction Of labor cost
| in the product.
High wages to labor and cheaper product
are correlative terms. Low wages 10 labor
and costlier product are correlative
terms. The one implies the othe
wherever labor eompetes with labor upon
otherwise equal ground. What pauper stands
any chance competing with the intelligent
artisan
Our highly-paid labor ensures the lowest
percentage Of labor-cost in the product, but
our tariff taxes upon raw materials handicap
American manufacturers with the highest per-
centage Of cost Of material in the product
The result Is that capital and labor united in
our American industrial products, despite our
advantage in the most hghly-paid and efh-
Gent labor, are put into hopeless competition
with the industrial products Of other nations,
none Of which taxes raw materials. The ad-
vantage we possess in the most efficient and
highly paid labor in the world is nullihed BY
the self-imposed disadvantage Of tariff taxed
raw material, with which our labor Is
inwrought.
The total value Of our domestic exports for
the last fiscal year was almost exactly
S666, ,000, 900, Of which SO per cent were the
products Of our fields, forests, fisheries and
mines and l6 per cent only were the sum total
Of manufactured products in which American
labor was inwrought.
In the last quarter Of a century, progress in
telegraphs, transportation, labor saving in
ventons, and the mechanic arts has reduced
the profits of capital and the rate Of inter-
est by more than e-half; has increased
the wages Of labor throughout the
world; has augmented by at least a
tnfrd tfaa, surplus which our manufacturers
can produce beyond domestic needs for sale
abroad. ProloneinR, without necessity our
war tariff taxes on raw ni6sserials, we have zen
undersold and excluded from asnreisn market.
by nations not taxing raw materiaIn
their low priced inferior labor and tie kixn-r
percentage Of labor-cost therefore included in
their product, our taxed raw matefs~~ and
their free raw materials have D-o-
tected the so-called "pauper labor ssog
Europe against American competition. OAs'e
increasing capacity to produce an industrial
surplusage has been accompanied by war taxa
ton exactly suited to prevent the sale Of that
surplusage in foreign markets. Out Of our
actual abundance this war taxation has forged
the instrument OF our industrial and CONNER
cial mutlation. Defeating our manufacturers
in their endeavor to compete abroad with the
manufacturers Of untaxed raw materials, il
has set them on a ferocious competition at cut
throat prices in our own home market, 10
which they are shutup, and for which theirpro-
ducing powers are increasingly superabundant.
These prolonged war tariff taxes, incompetent
and brutal as a scheme of revenue, fatal 70 the
extension Of our foreign markets, and disorder
ly to our domestic trade, have, in the lastresort.
acted and reacted with most ruinous injury
upon our wage-earners. As the more numer-
GUS part of our population. our wage-earners
are Of course the hrst the last and the most to
be affected by injurious laws. Every govern
ment by true statesmen win watchfully regard
their condition and interests. II these are
satisfactory, nothing else can be of very mo-
mentous Importance but our so-ealled pro-
tective craftsmanship has disfavored them al
together. Encumbering with clumsy help few
thousand employers, il has trodden down the
millions Of wage earners. II has for twenty
one years denied them even the peaceable fruits
Of liberty.
II is proposed to reduce taxation by cutting
down the tax on whiskey, tobacco and beers.
and removing the duty on sugar.
Nobody pays tax on tobacco except the
consumers Of tobacco. They are willing 10
pay for the luxury, and they ask no relief
Any probable reduction Of the tax on whiskey
would be more likely to increase the revenue
than 10 diminish IT, The price Of sugar has
fallen TO an exceedingly cheap rate. Our own
sugar crop is very small part Of the total
amount OF sugar we consume, that sugar ranks
next 10 articles wholly produced abroad, like
tea and coffee in suitability for taxation, on
the ground that its consumption is universal,
that the tax is easily and cheaply collected,
that the increased price paid by the consum-
ers is an unconsdered trife, and that what Is
taken from the tax payers goes into the tax
payers treasury, not into a few private bank
accounts.
The taxes to be first remitted are those
which prevent OF hinder the sale of our sur
plus products in foreign markets Their re-
moval will set capital in motion by the promise
Of better returns, enlarge the steady employ
ment and increase the annual income Of many
thousand wage-earners, whose prosperity viii
diffuse prosperity. These taxes are the duties
on raw materials and the most widely injuri-
Gus Of them is the tax upon raw wool. But
the income Of all the wage-earner in the
United Stetes can be at once enlarged effective
ly, certainly permanently, by reducing the
cost TO them Of the great necessi-
ties Of life. Oar war tariff
taxes increase needlessly the cost Of clothing,
shelter, food 70 every family. Every wage
earner's expense, every tax payers expense, for
the clothing Of himself and his family is nearly
doubled, at least in the Northern Middle and
Western States, by taxation which can now be
remitted, yet leave the treasury a sufficient
revenue.
respectfully recommend to Congress that
they confer upon the wage-earners Of the
United States the boon of untaxed clothing,
and in order thereto, the immediate passage Of
an act simply and solely placing raw wool
upon the free list.
OF course, repeal Of the duty should be
followed by, but need not wait for, com
pensating adjustment Of the duties on
manufactured woolens whilst our man
ufacturers are learning the lesson
that with the highest paid and most efficient
labor in the world, with the most skilled man
agement and the best inventive appliances,
they need fear no competition from any rivals
| in the world in home OF foreign markets. 30
long as they can buy their woods free, Of every
| kind
But the common daily clothing Of the
American people need not be taxed therefore.
il ought not TO be taxed; TO free their clothing
Of taxes viii finally reduce, by half their ex-
4 Il a.. IL.