Workmen's advocate., 1890-05-10

| 'S'"' ''' '"Jtfr tt tHtpt'gtf, UuHtS IO pdy the toWeSt possible prlce for the Sdme
 In word, labor has to-day become a commodity, and as such must yield to the conditions of trade.
 But the commodity "labor" is at an undoubted disadvantage, as compared with other commodities, If l have in my store linen, cloth, grain or shoes as goods, can delay until, and seize upon favorable opportunities for selling the same The proprietor of the commodity "labor namely, the worklngman--can not thus delay. Only in exceptional cases Is he so situated that he can wait weeks or even months to see if the price will not advance. As rule he is obliged to sell daily or--starve.
 | Now, as every one knows, the more there Is on hand of an article and the less demand for an article the lower the price Of the same goes; and the less there Is on hand and the more demand. the higher the price rlses. It is precisely so with the article labor. The more em- | ployes in any branch of industry that are actually required, the lower go their wages, and race ueFSd Any child can understand this, and every workingmau knows 1t by practical experience But the capitalists method of the present day, when, with hardly an excep- uon, the manufacturing of the country Is carried on with steam power and | machinery, has an increasing effect to 1 dispense with the large number of hands formerly required to accomplish I certain amount of work, and to turn many adrift idle handed.
 Let Us consider some establishment where hand work is as yet in vogue; | There are, say, a thousand operatives engaged in little shops or yards to pre-. | pare a certain amount of goods in a given length of time. Very we'll Now there steps in huge power-the capi- talistic method of production with i'm mense factories, and behold the same amount of labor Is performed by one. tenth the number of hands. The other | nlne-tenths, or 900 human beings, are in consequence thrown out; their compe- tition depresses the wages of those still retained; they throng to other estab- ilshments and depress the wages there for they must live. and in order to live they must sell their labor, no matter at how a price, This is the present state of affairs in all civilized countries. Handwork disappears, superseded by machine production.
 But it does not stop there. When machinery was first introduced the operators were obliged to possess a cer- tain amount of skill. The machines were not yet perfected and they re- quired to be managed by those who un- derstood their business. But the greed of money making impels employers to seek more and more mechanical per fe e'tion, and in two ways.
 First, the machines are constructed to make but one part of an article. and thus may be managed by tyros or by women, or even children just big enough to hold the work Then the mech nism is so improved that the rapidlty of production is increased and more work turned off in the same length of time. The result is that out of the hundred workers originally required in the shop, perhaps only 50 or 70 are re tained, onethird of these being women or half-grown youths. But all these must toll late and early, for the more they work the more profitable becomes the machine to the boss and all must content themselves with pitiful earn ings!
 So it goes in all branches of industry, from year to year growing constantly worse, and here m America the number Of those who depress wages by having work only part of the time and spend ing the rest of the year seeking from shop to shop-that is, if they do not be- come regular tramps-the number of these unfortunates who cannot sell their labor, even at the lowest prices, is steadily augmented by hundreds of thousands of immigrants who, for their part, have been accustomed to even worse than those obtained in this country. This capitaistic mode of prdluction has still another disadvantage; 1t is responsible for sudden shuttings down and lasting crises through which workingmen come to the very worst. Perhaps they have toiled often overtime, day and night All at once comes crash! The demand for goods has ceased, and it is found that the supply is far too great The manufacturer allows work to proceed for time, but wages are reduced. The million workers can buy nothing, con- sume nothing, and the result is further cessation Iof demand for skilled labor. And So the manufacturer must shut down, and the operatives go forth upon the street.
 This has occurred, as every worker knows, oftener and oftener of late. And, under such pressure. the exhaustion from working hard and long, the suffer lngs consequent upon intervals of en- forced idlenes, the workingman, de- prived of fitness to fulfill the duties or enjoy the privileges of a human being, father of family or citizen, is reduced to mere living machine.
 What is then to be done? How is this evil to be, in some slight degree, remedied? A complete and permanent change can only be effected by the ap -l.