The Minneapolis journal., 1902-12-16
Paternalism vs.. High Wages

Paternalism VS.. High, Wages 8: i.
Among the efforts that are heard of on
ton Of difficulties between labor and cap
ital, some Of the most conspicuous have
proceeded from real or genuine altru-
ism on the part of the employer. There
are in America, Heaven knows how many
kind hearted, considerate employers who
spend many hours daily planning and
thinking how to better their relations with
their men.
Some Of these employers consider the
simplest method the best and make 1t a
rule to pay their men all the business Will
bear. In almost any city you will find that
one or more firms In some Industry are
distinguished from their competitors by
reason of reputation for paying better
wages and salaries and better treatment
of their employees.
But more of the employers who have
been studying the great problem have of
late turned toward paternalism. They
have considered that they have a great
responsibility to bear for their men, and
they have set about improving their con-
dition in the same way that kind father
looks after his childrn. They have organ
lied clubs, opened night schools, estab-
lished factory libraries and club rooms,
provided free amusements, built special
lodging and eating houses for their en-
ployes and employed high salaried social
secretaries, charged with the duty of bet
tering relations between employer and
employe.
Some Of these Undertakings appear to
haves met with great success, yet one OF
the most successful experime the Ma
tional Cash Register company, was sorely
grieved two years ago by long strike
among it's employees. Many commentators
on the strike at the time took it as an eVl-
dence of the .refractoriness Of labor gen
orally and the uselessness OF trying TO 40
ANYTHING to help it. We were also treated
to long discourses on the ingratitude of
labor, etc.
| Mr.. Lewis Nixon, now a member of the
Crescent Ship Building company, in an ad-
dress before the National Civic Federation
anpeared as an advocate Of the simple and
easy method of paying workmen" to the
limit, instead of foisting upon them LOT
of things they may not want and notW1th-
standing the good intentions Of the en-
ployer, may resent as a sort OF patronage
unworthy of free men. Il don't beNeve II
! giving the men what they may not want
Mr.. Nixon said. IF one wishes to give
vut1o
figure it out and give it to the men IN in
creased wages and shorter hours -~.
Whatever political economy may teacf
regarding the share of labor and what
ever employers may think about their owl
generosity. in. the matter of wages, the
working man as a rule believes that he is
not getting his fair share of the wealth he
is assisting to make. He often know:
that he is getting all that he is entitled tt
from his particular employer but If tina
employer is making so much money tina
he has a surplus to lavish on his owl
schemes for bettering the condition of hi
men. it is natural for the workman to sa!
that if the money is given to him he will
look out for his own betterment. 1t il
we'll known that members Of labor union
do not look with favor upon Carnegie Ii
braries, because they regard them as be
ing paid. for with a show Of liberalit.
and benevolence out of money wrung from
the Just deserts of Carnegie's men,
1t is rather strange that more of thes
well mea ming employers do not resort t.
profit sharing as a means of improving
4 their relations with their men, and max
the distribution, not on a philanthroplc ba
sis, but as an increment of earned remun
Grafton not received in the form of wages