Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1893-03-17
PAUPER LABOR.
MOST OF THE STATEMENTS CON-
CORNING 1T ARE HUMBUS.

NOT iend TO Lower Wages-Hfgh Prices
Cripple Commerce and Retard the
| Growth of Nations
| Do the high wages of the laborers in
new countries render their product any
| dearer, or do the low wages in old coun-
tries make their products any cheaper?
The answer to these questions will de-
eide whether or not a new country, or in
fact any country where wages are higher
than in competing countries, needs pro-
lection against foreign imports in order
to maintain its higher rate of wages.
The wages in free trade England are
neither SO low as those in protectionist
Russia, Belgium, Germany, France,
Italy or Spain, nor, by far, as low as
those in India, China or Japan. Yet, if
the free exchange of commodities be-
tween high and low wage countries
really tended to bring down wages, it
follows that English wori1ingmen would
receive as little as the Chinese cody in
his native land. But this is not all. Ac-
cording to Mr.. Andrew Carnegies rea-
soning in triumphant Democracy"
China, with its low wages, and not Eng
land, with it's high wages, ought to have
the worlds carrying trade. But how is
it possible for free trade England to pay
much higher wages than its protectionist
competitors, and how, again, is it possible
that England, and not China, nor even
Spain, Germany or Russia, aided by low
wages, dominate the commerce and the
carrying trade of the world? All of this
is done with British capital, under the
Brisish flag, while the ships are manned
for the major part with Britishers from
the captain down to the cabin boy.
So, contrary to Mr.. Carnegie's asser-
ton, the fact remains that Britain, the
only free trade country among the larger
and older nations, pays the highest
wages, has the most extensive COM
MERGE, the greatest commercial fleet, the
largest establishments for shipbuilding,
the most magnificent industrial edifce,
while British capital is so abundant that,
while paying higher wages than any
other old country, although the rest are
highly protected" it's capitalists are
even looking around for new opportuni-
ties to invest their surplus capital
According to Mr.. Carnegie, this very
desirable condition Of affairs ought to
exist in China, or, to stick to the eau
casian family, let us say Spain, because
wages there are SO very much lower than
in Britain. Why, now, is Great Britain,
''the wise old bird" able to distance all
its protectionist competitors in the race
for pre-eminence? Simply because the
business men of all classes and occupa-
tons in free trade Britain can buy what
they need where it is cheapest, and be-
cause its facilities for production and
transportation have become superior to
those of other nations. It is on this &C
count that the wages of the English may
be many times as high as those of other
nationalities whose methods of produc-
ton are inferior, and whose laws favor
domestic rings and monopolies.
Where, then, neither the laboring men
nor the industries of new country need
to be protected against foreign competi-
ton, what are protective laws good for?
The answer is, ''For the purpose of al
lowing owners of mines, forests, oil sup
plies, ETC., to get a higher price for the
raw material they produce and to enable
manufacturers of protected interests by
all sorts of combinations to form artii-
cial monopolies and thereby to raise the
prices of their goods on the one hand
while on the other they are able to pay
less to their operatives than they would
be obliged to if there existed no impedi-
ment to the free importation of COM
modities." This is one of the principal
reasons of the almost fabulous growth
of large private fortunes in protectionist
new countries.
The protection allows protected en-
ployers not only to tax their fellow citi-
zens, but also enables them to cut down
the wages of their laborers and to kill
or provoke strikes at will and declare
lockouts, because the tax upon goods
coming from abroad is so very high that
the domestic producers-i. e., the en-
ployers, have the domestic market all to
themselves, and thus can, by producing
as little as they please, make certain
commodities as scarce as they like, and
thereby carry up prices to just within
the limits of the protective wall called
the tariff. The consequence of all this
is that the laboring men in protected in
dustries are in many cases entirely at
the mercy of their employers, and that
strikes in such industries, while putting
stop to production and raising prices,
are more often unsuccessful than in I'M
protected industries.
1t is not the question whether the
wage earners in new countries receive
higher wages than their fellow work
men in old countries, but whether they
receive as large share of what they
produce as would be the case if the alb
sence of certain conditions favored a
more equal division of the product be-
tween laborers and capitalists. What
in older countries goes to the landlord
in the shape of high rents, in new coun-
tries, where there is hardly any rent to
be paid, ought to go to the laborer.
And where no artificial, legal monopo-
lies enable certain classes of producers
20 levy tax upon other producers as well
as upon all consumers, it must be plain
that the competition of capital with
capital for the services of laborers
will be so active that the profits upon
capital remain normal, while the wages
will steadily rise and prices of all COM
modities will rather tend to fall than to
go up. Then also it will be observed
that the growth of the wealth of the
country will have in its train, and as a
natural consequence, growth in the
earnings and savings of the wagework-