The weekly examiner., 1901-05-25
A PROBLEM SOLVED.
Dorothy Dix on the Scheme of Mar
 rvinnr Horanra Ccuanofi&nra

A new prophet has arisen m the west. A second Daniel has come to judgment and with one happy sugges- tion solved the whole vexed woman labor problem.
 At a recent meeting of the Metal Polishers and Brass Workers associa- tion in Milwaukee MT. c. B. Myers, one of the delegates, announced that the men employees of the Wolff Manu- featuring company of Chicago had suc- cessfully adopted a new method of pre- venting women from working in the shop. They marry the women. MT. Myers furthermore urged upon the con- vention that instead of seeking to crowd women out of business the men employed alongside of them either marry them or find good husbands for them.
 This is the first feasible solution that has ever been offered for one of the great problems of the day. Ever since women quit working in the kitchen for their board and clothes and went to working for money in stores and offices every now and then somebody raises howl of protest against wo- man labor. They say, with shrieks of indignation, that woman is invading all the gainful occupations, that she is crowding man at every turn in the world of labor and that he cannot con- pete with her because she will work for less wages.
 Just why a woman hasn't as much right as man to make bread and butter and even jam for herself if she can has never been satisfactorily ex- plained. There seems to be, however, a deeply rooted feeling that it is much more ladylike and commendable in her to go hungry than it is to hold down a good job, and there is general prejudice against the working woman as one who has got uninvited into the banquet, yet whom nobody knows how to put out.
 She is always represented as freak who insists on leaving a luxurious home in order to indulge in the hilari- ous excitement of keeping books or standing behind counter eight hours day, and it is the fashion to picture her as a monster of industry who works for the fun of the thing and to whom pay is not so much an object as steady employment.
 Just how idiotic this view of the mat ter. is ought to be apparent to every one. Nobody ever personally knew a young girl who preferred office work to pink teas, and if the working woman does work for less money than man it is because she has to, not because she wants to. Upsetting as it may be to the theorist, it is fact that there isn't a working woman alive who wouldn't jump at raise in her salary.
 It is one thing, though, to see diff culty and another to find way out of it. The working woman might be re- garded as menace to masculine labor, but it was so manifestly absurd to ex- living to give it up and go off and starye that nobody had the nerve to ask it of her. It left the problem of how to get rid of woman cheap labor still unsolved until MT. Myers and the employees of the Wolff Manufacturing company tackled the subject.
 They say marry it, and it's good advice. The man who -marries his commercial competitor not only puts rival out of business, but secures a practical and valuable life partner for himself. He also takes a long shot at happiness. The man who succeeds in these strenu- ous times is the man who thinks shop and talks shop 24 hours out of the day, and if he weds woman who has been in the same business he is certain of an unwearied listener, to whom the details of the dry goods trade or the price of ie, ,f nh nd exciting interest. There is no stronger bond of union than the same occupa- tion.
 Nor need any one fear any undue op- position from the other side to this way of settling the woman labor question. There isn't one woman in a thousand who would espouse a career if she could get a man and who wouldn't rather rock a cradle than pound type writer. That the working woman isn't unduly welded to her occupation is sufficiently proved by the alacrity with which she divorces herself from it when a husband comes along. Indeed so willing is she to let somebody else do the supporting that it is no uncom- mon thing to see a girl give up $1OO job for a $6O man, and the commonest complaint against employing women is that about the time a girl gets to be really useful and knows her business she goes off and gets married.
 At all events MT. Myers and the Wolff Manufacturing company have offered the practical solution of the woman labor problem. It is up to men now to marry their business rivals or quit kicking about woman's competi- tion. They must put up or shut up.-I Dorothy Dix in New York Journal.
 Labor Headquarters.
 41,,- e%orry front h0T1So