Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1890-02-07
ABOUT PROFIT SHARING.
SOME INSTANCES OF ITS OPERA
TON IN EUROPE.

The System Is Fifty Years Old-How It
Worked with Leclaire, the French House
Painter-The Unsuccessful Side, as Shown
in the wildwood Collieries.
The system of dividing a proportion Of
profits among wage earners is no new thing.
It is now nearly fifty years since Edne Jean
Leclaire, French house painter in large
and prosperous way of business, who had
risen from the humblest beginnings deter
mined to secure the honest cooperation of his
employees by giving UP to them portion of
the income which they helped him to gain.
In the face of the greatest mistrust and OPP
position, Leclare stood by his intention; and
at the end of 1912, the first year of his exper-
iment. distributed among his men :e475, or
an average of over e10 apiece. This very
practical proof of the genuineness of Le-
claire's intentions Immediately dsarmed the
suspicious of his workmen, who needed no
further inducement to make the most of the
opportunity offered by their masters clear
headed generosity. Once fairly started, the
plan prospered exceedingly, to the advantage
of both giver and receiver; and its success
has never been in doubt from the day of its
Inauguration to the present. OF the advan-
to state that i'll the forty years from 1912 to
1882 sum of e133,045 was paid to them in
addition to wages on the usual scale.
Not all the share of profits allotted to the
workmen was paid over in cash. Modifca-
tions demanded by circumstances were made
when necessary in the original scheme; but
the mode OF distribution finally assumed the
following shape: One-fourth of the profits
earned went to the managing directors, who
were also salaried and received interest at 4
per cent on their capital invested in the bust
ness; one-half went to the workmen as a cash
bonus, and the remaining quarter went to Il
mutual aid society equivalent to provident
fund. This society thus splendidly subsi
died very soon developed into an institution
which of itself must have offered strong
temptation to workmen to take service with
the Maison Leclaire. To every member of
the age Of so, and who has worked twenty
years for the firm, it gives a pension of 94S,
and insures the lives of all for e4O
The method Of dividing the share of profits
allotted to workmen between cash payment
at the end of each year and subscription to
provident fund, is that adopted by most of
the houses which practice profit sharing
Some there are, however, which pay over the
whole amount in cash, as, for instance, NJ
Bord, the pianoforte maker. M. Bord intro
duced the system into his business on account
of a strike in 1865, and has since then paid
over considerable portion of his profits to
all workmen who have been in his employ for
six successive months. In 1882 the sum given
away was e5, 205, being 20 per cent. of the
whole amount paid in wages during the year.
At the other extreme stands the system
employed by the Compagnie d'Assurances
Generates, under which 5 per cent ON the net
profits of the business is set aside for the ben
eft of the employees and allowed to accumu-
late at interest till after twenty-five years
service, when the amount is invested for the
benefit of the owner, who is allowed to take
the interest, but not to touch the capital No
actual money bonus is paid at all. Yet an
other manner of profit sharing is that prac-
ticed by some limited liability companies, in
which a certain number of shares are set
aside for workmen and offered to them on
specially favorable terms. In one shape or
another participation of profits has found a
good deal of favor on the Continent, where
many firms have adopted it, with generally
very beneficial results to all parties concerned
One strikingly successful instance was
brought under notice year or so ago on
the death of Nine. Boucicaut, of the Bon
Marche, Paris, whose clerks and shopmen
hold three-ffths of the very large capital
represented in the business Another is that
of the Maison Chalk, which runs the book
stalls at French railway stations, and pro-
duces those amazingly complicated time
tables.
In England profit sharing has never
"caught on" as it has abroad Still, from
time to time, various firms in different parts
of the country have made the experiment,
and most of them have found it pay to go on
with. But at the present time the whole
number of them does not amount to more
than two dozen. Among them may be men
toned Messrs. Cassell & Co., whose workmen
enjoy the benefits of provident fund estab-
lished out of the firms profits, and Messrs
Burroughs, Welcome & Co., the chemists,
whose 200 workmen are paid a cash bonus
Messrs. Thomas Bushill & Sons, printers and
manufacturing stationers, of Coventry, who
recently started a profit sharing system diff
fering in some slight respects from that of
any other house, were awarded a silver
medal for their rules in the social economy
system of the Paris exhibition. Their first
years trial has been very successful, bonus
of six weeks wages having been allotted to
their workmen in addition to a sum placed
to reserve.
The other side of the shield is seen in the
notorious example of the Wildwood collier
les. The case is an interestin" one at the
present moment, as the imneli e cause of
the final abandonment of participation was
the Intervention between the company and
its men of the Miners union In 1864 on
the reconstruction of the company, it was
provided that one-half of any excess profits,
after the payment ofa 10 per cent. dividend,
should be distributed among all the men en-
ployed by the company in proportion to their
respective earnings. For some years the
system worked admirably. In 1872 came the
"boom" in the coal trade, and in consider
alton of rapidly rising prices the men asked
and were granted an advance on their
wages amounting to nearly 80 per cent,
while at the same time it was arranged
that dividend of Is per cent. should be paid
before the profit sharing should come into
operation. Even these altered conditions
were highly satisfactory to the men; in June,
1874, Ella, 256 was distributed among them as
against e5, $50 in the previous year. In the
latter half of 1874 prices declined, and a gen.
eral reduction of wages in the trade became
necessary. The companys men joined in
the general strike which ensued, and on the
shareholders protesting against any further
payment of the bonus it was discontinued.
The Miners union looked unfavorably on
the industrial partnership in force at the
Wildwood collieries. The men were taught
to think that the money distributed to them
at the end of the year was their just due, and
was nothing more than deferred payment
which should have been spread over their
weekly wages. The time came at last when
difference arose between the company and its
men on a technical point-the use of riddles !"
The position assumed by the men was alike
unreasonable and unfair; but they were
backed by the union, and in the name of the
union resolution was posted declaring the
intention of the men never again to submit
their masters and drove them in disgust to
discontinue the aaartpershiIa in 1a,otitS st