The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-09-08
PROGRESS AWAY FROM POVERTY.

creased wonderfully In the united states
| during the last twenty years; the average
| wages paid TO all men and women in man
/ ufactures, according to census of 1860, was
| s2s9 each. while in 1880 it was 1916. The
total assessed yalution of property FOR the
| whole country is s24, 249 $50, S04, as COM
pared with $f6,092, 500, 543 in 1880, an in
crease of 81, $40, SOC, 26l Expressed in per-
centages this is an increase Of over 43 per
cent. since $780, The increase itself ex-
ceeds the true value of all property as re-
turned by the census of 1850. The assessed
valuation per capita in 1880, exclusive of
Oklahoma, was $3s7.62, as compared with
1897. 01 in 1880.
Assuming that the same relation existed
between assessed valuation and true yaIu-
alton in 1880 as existed in 1880, the abso-
lutte wealth of the United States may be
estimated at $62,6l0, 100000 This would
be nearly $1,000 per capita, according to
the estimate of population made by the
eleventh census, as compared with 1870
per capita in $780, $3.50 per capita in 1870
and $5i4 per capita in 1850.
Of the distribution of this wealth it is
safe to say that the proportion of property
owned blythe middle or poorer classes has
not diminished at all during the last decade
The whole state of New York once covered
by manor rights and large land grants, is
now divided into some $50, 900 moderate
sized farms. Duchess county, once COW
cred by large land grants, is now divided
into $40 farms, only two of which have
Yhap =
no tendency TO land monopoly in
the great and wealthy state of New York
| Wages per capita have increased in
the last thirty years in large pro-
| portion and the cost of necessaries Of life
have decreased 80 per cent according to
| the official industrial statistics and the
| computations Of David A. Wells and
| Edward Atkinson, while the food con-
sumption both in quantity and quality is
wonderfully increased and improved.
| Atkinson's figures show that the average
rate of wages is higher in nearly every art
of material Importance than ever before
and that the prices of the necessities of
life lower than they have been since 1910.
| We quote:
II we compute wages both in rate and in pur-
| chasing power, men of special skill and aptitude
| who now occupied as foremen, overseers OF
| in the very highess departments of the me-
| chanic arts, are 100 per cent better Off than at
| the date named for comparison, to-wit: 1S65-67.
The average mechanic or artisan is Is per cent.
| better oil. The Common laborer is Go per cent.
| better off.
The poor have certainly not grown
poorer in the last thirty years, and while
during the exceptional period of the great
revolution in industrial methods of trans
portation which has taken place in the
last half century made possible the ac-
quirement of Vanderbilt fortunes, the &C
emulation of such great fortunes in
single hands is not likely to repeat itself,
and the tendency is rather to the
| diffusion of wealth and its segregation
into the hands of comparatively larger
bodies of men. Corporations, cooperative
associations. labor organizations are diff
fusive agencies and Inheritance is a con-
slant distributive force. The census re-
turns show that pauperism is decreasing,
the ratio in 1850 having been | to 75S, lille
at present it is l to So. The wealth of
| Vanderbilt applied to the creation OF the
trunk line system made it possible for
| Dakota TO give New York cheaper wheat
in exchange for cheaper manufactures.
and thus the earnings of every man in the
| United States were increased; the gains of
the great corporations were large. but the
gain and benefit to the whole public was
immense; it is not by the accumulation
and administration OF such fortunes that
the poor grow poorer; on the contrary, it
is men like Vanderbilt that have prevented
the poor from growing poorer by helping
to reduce the cost of living and by multi
plying the opportunities tor labor. Labor
has q better and cheaper home mar
ket both to buy and sell in:
il gets better wages. and better
prices for its product, and it lis
an insult to intelligent labor To tell II
today that the rich are growing richer and
the poor poorer. which is the staple false
hood of the fluent labor demagoguc. who
is like the brass band that mistakes itself
for the entire procession. The only poor
that are growing poorer are those whom
the TeTas Sl0in3s describes as ALWAYS
looking for employment and always con-
graduating themselves they can't find
any,"