The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1893-08-24
But Little Doing in the Building
Trades.
THE SKILLED WoRKMEN.
Unions See the Danger OF Over
crowding.
How the Utah AsphaItum Beds Would Be
Operated by Syndicate-Work of
the Rescue Observation-Disclosures
ing Local Labor News.

blear-eyed tramp called at our back door
for something to eat. My wife told him
to take the sickle and cut down some
weeds at the back of the lot while she was
getting the food. When she came out
ten minutes afterwards TO call him to his
meal he had disappeared and taken the
sickle with him. The majority of those
who call at your back door are much
higher in The scale of decency than this
one was, but is society wholly blaneless
for the existence of even these lowest
specimens? Tramps are made. not born,
and it is not difficult to imagine the pro-
cess Of their eyolution-or rather degra-
dation.
In their first stage they are decent, av-
erage citizens. They are fairly industrl-
GUS but don't see the necessity of saving
much OF anything. They smoke their
pipe and take their glass of beer, and
while without any great moral stamina
they pay their debts and would wrong no
man maliciously. The are prob
ably among the first to be
thrown out of work when a de-
preston comes. as the first to strike when
q difference arises with their employer.
After rioting for few days they hunt
around for another job. But it is not as
easy to find as they expected. Their few
dollars of savings disappear and they
beat their way on a train TO another town
where they hear there is work.
They find no work there. They have to
sleep wherever they can and begin TO look
seedy and ragged. They have TO apply
for something to eat and are as often
driven away as fed. They begin to feel
bitter and are ready to help themselves to
other peoples property. Driven from
ooor to door and repulsed where they ex-
pected to find work they begin to lose
self-respect and courage. They are per-
mitted to sit in the saloon and are some
times invited up to the bar for q drink.
At last they conclude that the world owes
them living any way and they are not
anxious to get work as long as they can
get free lunch and an occasional drink
of beer.
The men are now lazy, good for
nothing tramps, with very little
prospect that they VIII ever
be anything else. Yet had they found
work in the early months OF their search
they would have remained decent, self
supporting citizens. They would never
been great moral lights, but they would
have been the fair, average laborer and
citizen that make up the great bulk OF
the population of our country. By hold
ing society partly responsible for his ex-
istence, do not mean that society should
provide him with work. But society
should see that the opportunities for work
are not monopolized by a comparative
few. That every man who desires work
shall be able to find it.
Building Inspector Hamlin says work
in the building trades is absolutely dead,
and the number of idle men is steadily
increasing. No new work is going up,
nor is there likely to be any for some
time to come. The only hope is that
something will be done for silver, and
things Ia that direction are certainly more
encouraging than they were week ago.
1t is afavorite theory with q good many
people that If every man had a thorough
trade and good education every work
man would have work at good wages and
involuntary poverty would be abolished.
1t is cutie true that a skilled workman
gets higher wages than an unskllled;
that an educated mechanic is paid better
wages than an ignorant one. But why is
this? Not on account of his education or
skill, but because there are fewer OF them.
The skilled engineer is no more necessary
TO the sale running OF the train than the
ignorant laborer who keeps the track in
repair. If engineers were as numerous as
railroad navvys, does anyone believe their
wages would be any higher than the
navvy's? And if only few were willing
TO do the work of the navy wouldn't
wages go away up?
l have never found trade or profession
which was not thought to be over
crowded by those working in it. Trades
unions see the danger of over crowding,
and so they try and place restrictions by
limiting the number of apprentices that
can be employed in any shop.
In the early days of the telegraph, OPP
orators were considered skilled workmen
and their wages were high. Many learned
the business aud after a time operators
became SO numerous that wages began
to be cut, until today they are below
those of an ordinary mechanic. The same
is true of typewriters, stenographers and
manv trades. To be sure we are contin-
ually told that there is always room at
the top. But this is only because COM
paratively few can get there If every
one got there who tried, there would be
as much crowding there as among the
Submerged" portion at the foot Of the
ladder.
There is in reality only limited de-
mand for great skill or ability. It is
from the middle and lower departments
of industry that the great demand for
labor must come. It is not through q
change of occupation that any permanent
benefit can be secured by the workers.
This only tends to bring down the wages
of the better paid. What other possible
and low price of labor except the OPEN
ing of new opportunities for work?
How opportunities which should afford
labor for thousands are monopolized by
few is shown by the proposal to lease the
Utah asphaltum beds to an eastern Svndi-
cate. Here is nearly one hundred square
miles containing asphaltum, gold, silver,
lead and other and more rare minerals
Il these lands were opened under the
provisions Of our mining laws they would
afford employment for thousands of men.
Under the free competition thus secured
there would be no restriction of produc-
ton or artificial increase of price. This
increased production would soon bring
railroads which would make possible q
still fuller development of the country.
Under the operations of a syndicate.
however, production could and probably
would be limited to the lowest amount at
which the highest price could be secured.
The demand for labor being thus limited,
the wages TO labor could be kept at
the lowest point at which the laboring
man would consent to work. If this
lease is consumated it will be one of the
greatest outrages perpetrated on Utah.
We see the same monopolizatiou of the
oil fields in Wyoming. The most vaiu-
able of these are held by the Standard Oil
company. IL they were held for use to
increase production and give employment
to labor there would be no objection to
the Standard company owning them, for
q large company can produce more
chesply than small concern. But they
are not used. Wells that have been
opened Rre now plugged up end these
great reservoirs ars locked up 10 prevent
competition and production.
The same je largely arue of the coal