Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-08-07
WAGES OF BUILDERS.
A First-Class Bricklayer Earns Ten
Dollars a Week in London.
THE OTHER TRADES WORSE PAID.
Opinion Of Young Labor Leader of the
Whitechapel District.
ENGLAND'S HOPE Is IN ITS BOYS

amounting to the snug sum of $500, for the
alleged reason that there had recently
been an all round increase in wages
among the various classes of workmen he
was employing, seemed to be so unusual and
80 very refres hing an item of news that L
at once marked it for further investigation.
What made this instance all the more re-
markable was that the concessions had
come from London vestry, our previous
observations having fully convinced us
that of all the numerous forms of local mis-
government by means of which, the in differ
ent sections of this metropolis, the poor are
oppressed, and ill-paid labor is ground as
between the upper and neither millstones,
the vestry, in any prize show of things un-
popular and odious, would have an easy
walkover for the blue ribbon. Personifed.
the Vestry means humble, and humble, to
the Londoner, is . synonym for fussiness,
and petty oppression. Vestry wages in
most parishes are positive scandal
A long week of hard toll on the streets is
compensated at Greenwich, We are told. by
the pittance of 20 shillings, and the rate is
only little higher elsewhere But here
was an instance in which apparently some
good had come out of the vestry. 1t was
the Battersea Vestrv, by the way-thst sec
tion of London which had just done another
good thing in the return of Mr.. John Burns
as a labor representative to Parliament.
Possibly these two events were not merely
coincident, but were related to each other
logically, and it may T. that both were
prophetic of the dawnfhg here before long
of a veritable workingman's era
The Increase Was Not very Large.
But that feature of this vestry incident
which I judged would specially interest
readers in America was the statement that
there had just been an increase OF wages in
all branches of the building trade. Thus
found myself before long within the in
closure at Battersea, where the new Town
Hall and paroch;al Offices were going up,
and from the manager, who received me
quite civilly and spoke as though he had
nothing to conceal, I readily obtained the
information which follows.
1t was true that Mr.. Wallis, the contract
or, had been granted an additional sum of
money over and above the price at which
the Job vas taken, and it was also fact
that the grant had been made in view of an
unforeseen increase in wages, but this in
crease, save only in q single instance, was
not an actual, but merelys prospective one.
For the trades generally the new scale
would not take effect until November, and
at present the only class which had enjoyed
the rare sensation of an increase in the rate
of pay was the bricklayers. These had just
''gone up" from ninepence an hour to nine
pence ha'penny. This is about equivalent
to rise Of cent, and in the summer week
of 5211 hours it makes, of course, differ
ence of about that number of cents in the
amount they take home to support the
family upon. Roughly speaking, therefore,
the weekly earnings of frst-rate brick
layer in London, providing he works full
time, are $40 since the rise, as against So 90
before. In winter, of course, both hours
and pay suffer diminution. At that sea-
son, when living is at its hie hest, he would
get probably less than 50 for a full week,
even under the recent increase, and when it
is remembered that if he finds only the
apology of dwelling within the populous
districts of London his rent will cost him
50 90 or So week, and that he will have to
paw about 80 cents hundredweight for
coal, and 10 cents for 3h-pound loaf, with
meat of every kind still higher in proper
tion, the lot of this skilled and worthy Ia
borer will have figured itself out to be any
thing but Q sumptuous or even happy
one.
Nine Dollars q Week an Average.
Notwithstanding this, however, the Lon
don bricklayer is better off in the amount of
wages he gets than any other workers in the
building trade, with two exceptions only.
These are plumbers and what are called
stone fxera 1t is proverbial of the former
in our own country that they walk off with
the best plum in the labor pie, and they
seem to do the same over here. Yet how
little is this prize worth after all, when both
plumbers and stone fxers must work 52L
hours o week to pocket on Saturday the
meager sum of about $40 30! The superior
wages which these get is sometimes earned
also by plasterers, but the general run of
the latter fall a dollar below that figure.
The scale Tor masons, carpenters and skaters
is ninepence an hour. Painters get eight
pence an hour. For such kinds of labor as
scafolding, hoisting and handling of timber,
sixpence ha'pennv an hour is paid, and for
other grades of common labor only sixpence
Such at least were the figures given by
the manager at the buildings visited in Bat
tersea, and the best proof that they are not
lower than are actually paid is the fact that
the contractor for this work had just been
voted an increase on his bid, solely, as the
papers alleged in view of the increased d.
mensions of mis- pay roll. Perhaps, indeed,
on this very account the scale Of wages
given above might reasonably be discounted
little. But however that may be, the
contrast between these and American wages
in the same. lines of trade will be suffi-
ciently apparent for all practical purposes,
and it will be evident, also, from the facts
given in this and in former letters, that this
difference does not begin to be made UP to
the poorly paid British workman-in spite Of
the popular theory to that effect-bH any
advantage he may enjoy in the Sbst OF
living.
Saturday Evening in White cha tel.
From Battersea let us 60 to Whitechapel
he name suggests at once loathsome, mys-
terious and still unpunished crimes. But it
is also Synonymous with grinding poverty,
with i'll paid labor, with the tragic battle OF
the masses for subsistence, with rags and
vice, with drink and ever gnawing hunger
For those whose instincts incline them to
the vulgar occupation OF Summing" there
is plenty to be seen in Whitechapel. Scores
of visitors 60 there every day and every
night merely to view the localities of the late
blood curdling murders, and others go to reek
their imaginations in a so-called study OF the
degrading social conditions which made
atrocities of that sort possible.
My own visit was made for better pur-
pose, and perhaps, for that reason, 1 saw
things with more hopeful vision. 1t was
Saturday evening and not yet dark. did
not penetrate into the courts and alleys, and
candor compels me to report that what saw
on the principal thoroughfares was pleasing
rather than otherwise. The appearance OF
the people was no worse than that of the
average Saturday night crowd in the
poorer districts of London. One thing
which specially struck me was the large
number of we'll dressed Hebrews, with
''their wives. cousins and aunts," who were