The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-04-19


he not alone as now circumstanced cannot find
q sufficiency OF work, but that he is also com
PEELED to ask that the hours at which he can
luckily get work be shortened so that his less
fortunate brother may get an opportunity to earn
a sort of subsistence. Yet this is the result OF
over-production. We have but ourselves to
blame for it. Yes in my opinion, the eight hour
system will not alone be a benefit to the Aneri-
can workman as means of affording him rest
and an opportunity for mental improvement, but
also because it is need in the congested LABOR
market that we have rdiculously created.
WALTER NJ. GROVES, master workman
and district secretary of the Seamen's Be
nevolent assembly, closes a long letter in
advocacy of an eight-hour law as follows
Thirteen years agoI was in Melbourne, Aus
tralia and happened 10 be there on the annlVer-
sary of the eight-hour day. noticed with pleas
ure the splendid banner that was carried AT Ine
head of the procession, and read on it the follow.
ing inscription: Eight hours for work, eight
hours for recreation and eight hours for rest"
When man or woman has labored Tor ten or
twelve hours each day In the store, once, factory
mine or warehouse, will any fair minded man
say that they feel at the close of these hours OF
toll in fit frame of mind to take up anything
that will improve their minds or that they feel
like taking some refreshing recreation that is so
necessary in a crowded city like the present one
for the benefit of their own or famllys health!
No! they are too tired physically TO apply either
mind or body to ANYTHING but rest Consequently
the mind becomes crippled and uWaried ana
they thus become an easy tool to the machlna,
tons of those who have no wish that they should
ever become anything better.
But none of these gentlemen touches the
main point of the matter, and the one which
will regulate the hours of labor. We refer
to wages. 1t is, in fact, a question OF
wages and not one of hours. The employer
hires, or buys, so much labor; he does not
hire or buy hours of time. Experience has
taught that the average man will do so
much work in ten hours; the employer
knows how much that work is worth to
him, how much he can derive from it, and
he fixes the price he viii pay for it.
Wages being established on the
basis of the work which viii be
performed in ten hours, new
arrangement of the hours of labor-that is,
of the amount of work-will necessarily
require REIMBURSEMENT of the wages paid.
In other words, if man pays fair price
for ten hours work, he will not pay as
much for less work. He cannot pay as
much, assuming that he pays all the labor
is worth to him. Let rs suppose that
factory hand is worth 81 a day, or 20 cents
an hour for ten hours day; then let US
suppose that by legislative enactment or
otherwise, eight hours shall constitute
days work; will the factory hand re
ceive g day, as formerly: Not much, let
the statute laws, and the declarations OF
the labor organizations decree rs they may.
The laborer will receive Sl.60 for his eight
hours work, and the remaining 40 cents
will pay for the labor Of two more hours.
Ten hours may be too long time for
man to work; we think the hours
are too long. if man is faithful and
energetic worker. Besides, it leaves the
toiler little opportunity and less ambition
for the recreation which makes life
agreeable and existence healtbful. Bat
there can never come a time when
there will De shorter hours of work
with the same pay. There will never be
ten hours pay for eight hours labor.
Those who hope to bring this about are
as vainly as they would if they
were TO attempt to force down the price OF
sugar or coffee in the hands of the merchant
by asserting that the price was too high.
1t would be no trick at all to bring about an
day accompanied by eight hours
pay But that is not what the agitators
want: nor would the workers, many OF
them, accept such change for the ten
hours day with ten hours pay.
1t seems to us that labor, being thing Of
tangible value, thing the actual worth OF
which can be arrived at definitely, the eight
hour agitation as at present conducted must
result either in failure or in the men sur
rendering one fifth of their wages for the
privilege of working two hours less day:
this being based on the assumption that
wages are fair, labor being purchased for
what it is worth.