El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1898-08-18
One Evil of Specialized Labor.


Portland Oregonian.
The complaint which comes from the
harvest fields OF the increasing difficult
ty of finding efficient farm help Is only
an echo of what is heard from many
other sources. The country is full of
unemployed men, while at the same
time il men are wanted Tor any parttcu-
lar work they are not to be found. A
popular comment on this condition is
that those who cannot or who do not
find work are disqualified by their own
vicious habits, or that the public
schools, by turning out host OF half
educated persons, are directly respon-
sible. In both of these charges there Is
q certain measure of truth: but they do
not 90 to the bottom OF the difficulty.
Dissipation claims many victims, and
an unwise system of education has left
its mark upon many more; but cause
more general than both these together
Is the elaborate subdivision of labor
under the modern system of industry.
The fault of the system is that it does
not train men In any general sense. A
man brought up to some one little de-
tail OF manufacture and who finds his
labors superseded by invention, or for
any other cause finds himself out of
work, is the most helpless of created
beings. The system under which he
has been trained to work has stunted
instead of developed his powers.
1t is only a short while back when
a man who worked at shoemaking was
of necessity q trained shoemaker, com
petent in all the kinds of skill required
for the manufacture Oof q complete
pair of shoes. 1t was hardly possible
to reduce such q man, if he remained
sober and willing to work, to the rank
OF the unemployed, since with kit OF
tools which he would carry under his
arm he could move on to new locali-
ties and find some sort
of work in his line. The
modern shoemaker is quite another
kind of man. He is q specialist. pure
and simple, trained to one OF the many
small operations called for in shoe
making, but hardly better qualified to
make a complete pair of shoes than
any other man. An essential condi-
tion of his efficiency is q highly organiz-
ed establishment, in which there shall
be work enough in his speciality to
keep him employed. How easy it is
under stress of hard times for a man to
fall into the semi-pauper class-unem-
ployed and unemployable-my readily
be imagined.
There was time when the farm
hand was member of the farmers
family, working under an all-the-year-
round engagement and sharing in all
the labors of the place. In some loca
lities this system still prevails; and its
effects may be seen in the exceptional
character of the men. But in general,
and especially in the region of large
farms in Eastern Oregon and Wash
ington the farm b and has scarcely more
consideration and is oftentimes not
the The horses he drives. he is
hired when the rush is on, and dis
missed when it is past: and no thought
is given him until the time comes
around again when his services are re-
quired. And then there is surprise
and complaint because the race of farm
help is not what it used to be. The
truth is that the WORK, under such con-
has been largely abandoned by
disciplined and sober
ren, who easily find a better market
for their labor. 1t is the system that
Is at fault. 1t does not produce good
men; ana the fact ought to surprise
nobody.
Even in those departments of labor
usually classed as above work purely
creasingly difficult to find efficient
men. Here again appears an evil, due
to q severe system of classification.
Formerly, youth going into any
sort Of an tablishment-office, store
or bauk-had q chance to try his hand
at pretty much every kind of work
carried on in the place. For example
In the newspaper practice
OF twenty years ago, the whole
round of work was available to the
Youngest boy in the office, If he had the
aud energy to try it. Today
the work of any modern newspaper Of
dee is so classified and subdivided that
IL is all but impossible to attain q gen.
eral training. The same principle holds
good in other large departments of co
operative labor, both commercial and
professional. The modern sys-
tem-especially as we have it in large |
cities-tends to specialize and con-
.ract, rather than expand the capacity |
Of the persons engaged in them. And |
this fact, of itself, is one of the reasons |
Why the administrative posts in large |
sre almost universa ~ |
jlled by men drawn from smaller estab- |
ishments in which the classification |
has not become so extreme as to: pre- |
rent the development of the man of |