The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1902-02-15
LECLAIRE OF AMERICA.
N. o. Nelson Tells of His Profit-shar-
ing Business.

Oh f. Armstrong in Ainslee's9
Notwithstanding was instituted by the
Nelson company five years before the
colony at Leclaire was founded, and
the scheme includes the office and
store forces at st. Louis, as we'll as the
operatives at Leclaire. Until 1895 the
! dividends ranged from to 10 per cent
on salaries and wages, at first payable
in cash, and after 1890 in the form of
stock bonuses. The majority of the
| employees at St Louis and Leclaire are
| stockholders. Since 1895 the bonuses
! have been suspended, but only in the
[ sense that the cash value has been
| applied to improving Leclaire. We
| have used the earnings. says Mr.. Nell
| son, in enlarging the plant, in building
homes, and in providing and maintain
ing the public utilities We, in effect,
pay 10 or 10 per cent dividends by
working a nine-h hour day in trades that
are ten hours throughout the country,
in paying full union wages, when many
other manufacturers in our lines pay
10 or 10 per cent less. The profit-shar
ing plan is in force, and the cash divi-
dends will be resumed. At the same
time the people, as well as myself, re-
gard it Of more Importance at present
to provide good living conditions than
to get cash dividend
Like Leclaire. Mr.. Nelson is master
in his business, but when working
hours are over be becomes a social unit.
Then says he. I am one of the people,
and the mechanic who lives next door
that is to say, on the next LOTS as
good a man as L am He visits his
employees, they come in to see him; he
shares their indoor and outdoor social
reCreations: all are alike interested in
the development of Leclaire, its roads,
its gardens, its lawns. and the members
of his family mingle with the plain
folk without Condescension on one side
or failure of esteem and respect on the
other. Mr. Nelson's employees have
never presumed to interfere with his
management of the business. One of
their number used to look over the
books at the end of the year by invi-
tation, but Mr.. Nelson's word was good
enough for them. and they declined to
delegate anyone for the purpose This
in spite of the fact that Mr. Nelson
says of his relations with his men at
Leclaire: We get as far away from
the cash Nexus as we can
with all his success, Mr. Nelson
sometimes talks in way that would
stampede Gradgrind who was covert
ly meditating a trial of profit-sharing
with single EYE to his own bank ac-
count. Mr.. Nelson happens to be one
of those men who would sooner give
his employees an interest in his bust
ness than squeeze them to endow insti-
buttons. He dares to say that business
for profit only is immoral. He looks
on profit-sharing as a step toward CO.
operation, and believes that the CO.
II
more than a day dream. There is an
economic value in profit-sharing. he
holds; but it's justification must be JUS
tfce. This sounds like philanthropy.
until we remember that in many bust
nesses, whose proprietors would scout
the idea that they ever had philan-
thropic motive in their lives, a contin-
gent interest in profits is paid to heads
of departments, and stock is sold to
employees ON easy terms Strikes are
unknown at Leclaire In 1893. when
sales were slow and depression general.
wages We're reduced % per cent bv the
company. but so were salaries and in
terest. There was no complaint on the
part of the employees: everybody
worked with the same zeal: in three
months full pay was resumed. and at
the end of the year the % per cent
deducted was made up. Is it surpris
ing that Mr.. Nelson's industrial com
munity is a success and that his work
men are intelligent, industrious. con-
tened. loyal and self-respecting? This
is the place to insert an opinion. which
Mr.. Nelson expressed in 1892. Had
Carnegie, he said, adopted profit
sharing instead of the sliding scale
the chances are there would have been
no Homestead massacre, and the stop
page of work throughout the country
incidental to the strike would have
been avoided. 1t is important to APP
pond to this view that Mr.. Nelson is a
believer in labor unions. and encour-
ages his workmen to join them."