Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1892-08-26

workingman it must act in this fashion:
The duty upon foreign goods must be high
! enough either TO prevent their importation
| or SO to increase their price that they shall
| not undersell goods made in the United
| States. In other words, protection must
| either leave the American market exclu-
| slvely to the America.. manufacturer, Or it
| must see that prices are high enough to
| make sure that his goods sell at fair
| profit.
But where does the workingman come
| In? Nobody pretends that protected man
| hfacturers pay higher wages merely be-
cause they are able to do so. They pay the
| market rate. But what fixes the market
| rate? Workingmen and farmers can an
| swer this question as well as any one else
| If only they will stop moment to think
upon things that go on under their noses
Let US first ask the farmer what he knows
about wages. He sees that the pay of
farm laborers in winter, where there is lit
tie to do ard there are plenty of idle men
TO do it, is small. He sees that wages 20
up and up in harvest time when work Is
plenty end hands are scarce What, then,
fixes wages? Not the feeling Of the farmer
who hires vorknen, bat the amount Of
work to be done compared with the num-
Der Of men to do it, or, as the phrase is.
demand and supply.
What do workinrmen know about this
measured Every farm laborer sees lust
what the farmer sees, and all other kinds
Of wcrknaen see the same thing IF YOU
happen to have . trade requiring skill and
long apprenticeship, SO that compare
lively few men can get into it, wages il
that trade will be high, because the men
that work a it are scarce. If you happen
to do unskil1e6 work that any good, strong
man Of ordinary intelligence can DO, wacef
will be lower than in the ether trade, be.
cause most men have strong muscles AID
Intelligence enough to do such work. But
suppose 8 village is about to make new
streets, build sewers or 30 any other such
work that requires many day laborerst
don't you find that until TIC village gcts
more men asking for jobs than it has Jobs
TO give 1t must pay more than the usual
rate OF laborers' wages in that region? It
Is the old story IF demand and supply, and
the village docs not pay more wages be-
cause It is able to pay them, bat because It
must pay them.
Again, suppose men in particular
skilled trade form p labor union and ask
for higher wages. What happens? The
employer either pays the advance or re-
luStS W pay IL. ne refuses II ne DelleVeS
that he cannot easily get other men in
place Of those who ask more wages. Does
he pay the advance because protection or
something else makes him able to pay it?
No. but because he must pay it or quit
business. Here is the play of supply and
demand modified, not by protection, look
you, but by he artificial scarcity of labor
produced b. the formation Of working
mems union. Now and then we hear Of
protected employers who refuse to grant
the demands Of their men, lock them out,
and even go to war with them in order to
avoid paving an advance of wages, and
that, too, after congress has increased the
protection on the manufacturers products
in order that he may pay higher wages
This is the sort of humbu- that Repub-
lican protection is whenever you look it
Bquarely in the face