The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-06-20
PORTO RICAN LABOR,

the country The effective working
population is computed by DR.. Ames to
! be 601,271 He estimates that at least
half of these are wage-earners. Glass
distinctions, the line between the capt.
alist and the laborer, are much more
marked than in the United States, but
| the lack of incentive, stimulus and OPP
portunity is held to be the principal
cause of the low condition of the labor
/ ing men. There is more or less skilled
labor and the ordinary trades are all
represented, but the fact which most
! impresses the observer is the super
abundance of the lowest grade of I'M
skilled labor. Even planters living
within easy reach of the railroads, or
| of the sea, find it cheaper to transport
! their coffee, tobacco and other products
! to the ports on the heads of poems than
to use either the railroad, bull carts or
boats. The ordinary laborer's wage I'M
der Spanish rule was thirty cents a day
The Americans have undertaken to
raise it to fifty, but not with great sue
cess thus far.
DR.. Ames has compiled a table of
wage rates for various occupations.
Bakers get 81 to $3.50 for a day of
twelve to fifteen hours; blacksmiths,
s1.2O to $3.50 for a day of eight to ten
hours: brickmakers, s1.2O to 50 for
day of ten to twelve hours: carpenters,
81 to $3.50 for ten to twelve hours
These are fair samples of the skilled
| trades It is stated however, that
where the wage goes above $1.20 it is
for unusually skilled labor. In the
unskilled lines, coffee pickers and clean
ers get from twenty to sixty cents a
day; ordinary laborers, thirty cents to
$1.20; gardeners, fifty to ninety cents;
wood-choppers, thirty to sixty cents;
cane cutters, thirty to fifty cents; SER
wants, $3.50 to 81 per month. In COM
pairing these wage-rates with those of
| the United States it should be kept in
mind that the conditions which they
most nearly resemble, so far as I'M
skilled labor Is concerned. arc not those
of the North, but of the negroes of the
South. While lower than the ordinary
prevailing wages in the South, they are
not so much lower as to make the con-
| trast surprising.
There is, however, less for the labor
er to buy than in any part of this coun-
| try. His wants, outside of bare sub
sistence, are few. This is fortunate, for
his income is generally required to
! meet the necessities of bare subsist-
ence-food, shelter, fuel for cooking and
clothing, of which he wears only the
cheapest and not much of it. The Porto
Ricans love to congregate in villages,
where their huts bear some resemblance
/ to those of an African kraal. and com
mand a rental of sixty cents to 81 80
a month. Artisans houses are rented
for two and three times this sum. and
the best dwellings with gardens attach
ed are secured for $50 to 800 a year. The
most pitiful condition in the life of a
Porto Rican laborer relates to sickness
and death. Medical skill In the country
Is not good and hospitals are few. Deli
cacles are generally beyond the reach
OF the poor. The percentage of mortal
ity among women and children is fear
ful One is painfully impressed, wheth-
er in the streets of city or town or in
the hill country, by the number of HUI
man wrecks, the many beggars, and the
sunken-eyed, pallid, anaemic men, wo-
men and children. Extreme poverty,
hamilton and decrepitude are found,
and though the island is one of great
resources and has a good record for
thrift, there is reason to believe that
from the earliest days of the Spanish
Occupation this condition of things as
/
too prevalent and at times worse, in
some respects, than now.
! Perhaps the most striking contrast
between the Porto Rican and the Am
erican is seen in the burial If the
dead. often extreme poverty permits
only a winding sheet for the corpse,
which is carried to the grave suspended
from a pole borne on the shoulders of
IL mr. nriI
ilege of an undisturbed grave, the
bones being commonly exhumed after
a short time and placed in the ossuary
or bone crypt, which Is revolving feat
ure of every cemetery. "Oce may assert
without fear of contradiction" says Dr.
Ames, that the relative cost of sick
ness and burial, man for man, in the
same grade Of wage winners in the
United States and in Porto Rico would
be- as to sikness, as Is to 1, and IN re-
gard to burials, as 20 to 1, or even more
In the United States no expense is
spared in either. In Porto Rico none
Is incurred that it Is possible to avoid.
The living must be first considered"
The most agreeable reading in the re-
port is the description of improve
ments under American rule. New
sugar enterprises are being started,
abandoned lands brought under culti-
walton, and there are hopeful sisns Of
future prosperity, though the progress
thus far has been slow. The exchange
of the insular coinage for that of the
United States has worked a hardship
on the poor. The price of articles of
common consumption remains the same
in gold that it formerly was in de-
based currency, while wages have not |
advanced correspondingIy Ultimately, /
me change undoubtedly will benefit
the island, but it appears to have been
made too soon.
In commenting upon the above the
Buffalo Express says:
The difference between Porto Rico |
and other lands which the United
States has annexed at earlier periods Of
Its history is emphasized by this ac-
count of life in the island. While for
mer acquisitions were wild land open to [
American settlement and offering
fine field for the expansion of enterprise.
Porto Rico presents the problem of