Evening star., 1905-10-27
THE WAGES OF MINERS
Higher Than for Any Other
Form of Manual Labor.
TEN PER CENT ADVANCE
COMING CONVENTION TO BE HELD
AT SHAMoKIN.
Membership of the Unions Brought Up
to About 100, 900, but the Treasury
is Practically Empty.
BY WILLIAM E. CURTIS.
Special Correspondence of The Star and the Chicago
Record Herald.

The average wages earned by miners IN
the anthracite coal regions are higher than
for any other form of manual labor in the
United States and perhaps in the world
higher than the average earned by machin-
lists, carpenters and other building trades,
and equaled only by the earnings of a few
workmen In iron mills and furnaces. The
average of miners in the anthracite regions.
as shown by the report of the Roosevelt
commission, of which United States Judge
Gray was the chairman, are higher than
the average earned by several of the earned
professions, such clergymen and school
neutrality-suspicious. which require col
lege, or, at least, higher academic edu-
cation; while a miner may learn his trade
in two or three years. 1t is only neces-
sary for him to understand the geological
formal ton of a mine and how to handle its
product. Hungarian immigrants, who come
into the anthracite regions direct from Cas-
tie Garden-ignorant and illiterate-often
reach the miners grade after two years
of experience.
The Presbyterian denomination pays its
ministers better salaries than any other,
but If you will compare the average salary
received by Presbyterian clergymen (who
work 800 days in the year and are not pro-
tected either by an eight or even ten
hour law with the earnings of miners (who
week., as given in the wage tables of the
report of the Roosevelt commission you
will be satisfied that, so far as compensa-
ton is concerned, the latter have little to
complain of.
The average miner in the anthracite re-
gion goes down the shaft at or I o'clock
in the morning as many days as he pleases
and generally comes out about noon; or
whenever he has blasted out his stunt of
coal 1t may take him seven or eight hours
on % oh
the job in two and a half or three hours.
The average is about six hours. Ninety per
cent of the miners in the anthra cite regions
will be out of the shaft by noontime, or
soon after. There is no rule of time to
govern them. They are expected to fill so
many cars a day, and when that is done
their work is over. Their assistants, or
helpers remain in the mine to shovel
the coal into the cars and work nine hours,
being paid by the miners and not by the
company.
There has been an advance of 10 per cent
in the compensation of all employees in the
anthracite coal regions since the wage ta-
bles. which appear in the report of the
Roosevelt commission, Were made up Mr..
Gompers, president of the Federation of
Labor, is of the opinion that through the
influence of organized labor the wages OF
mine workers in the anthracite regions
have been advanced at least 80 per cent, di-
rectly and indirectly, during the past five
years. The unions have accomplished 9TH
er equally important results Tor the beneilt
of the miners. The facts can be ascertained d
in any mining town.
Variation in Miners and EMPLOYERS.
There is, of course, a very great diff
ference in mines. There are good mines and
bad mines-mines in which a man must
work hard to scrape up a living, and mines
in which it is comparatively easy. There
is wide difference between employers
and superintendents also. Some of them
are kind, helpful and conSiderate in their
treatment of the men; others treat them as
though they were slaves. The same diff
ference exists amonf the employees also.
Many of them are ignorant. vicious, lazy
and dissipated; others are Industrious in
telligent, temperate and well educated. If
you Will attend church in one of the mining
tOwns-say Tipped Lehigh, for illus ira ton
you will be surprised when you are told
that the congregation is composed almost
entirely of miners and other employees
about the mines. You will be willing to
admit that certain mines. at least. employ
a high class of labor. But if you attend
church in some other localities, which |
need not mention. you will see an entirely
different class of people.
The best men naturally find employment
in the best mines. Operators and superin-
tendents who treat their hands well natural
ly attract the best men. They will not
employ vicious dissipated miner; while,
on the other hand honest, industrious
and intelligent miner will not work for
the slave-drivers who, unfortunately are
in control of some of the Mines But un-
fortunately, in deciding questions of policy
and wages and In making regulations all
miners and all mines-good, bad and in
different-muSt be treated as q unit II Is
impossible to separate the good from the
bad and make two sets of rules. That is
one of the most serious objections to labor
unions, for they are purely democratic:
they treat all men equals and are too
often controlled by the least wise and
least worthy.
Wages of Miners.
Some miners make as much as $50 a
month. The majority could make that
amount IL they desired to work for it. The
average is reduced by the small earnings
of class of dissipated, lazy drones who
earn just enough to keep themselves in
liquor.
There q. 10 per cent increase in wages
five years ago; there was another increase
of 10 per cent In 1903, and Mr. Gompers
estimates that the determination of "store
orders and the payment of wages in cash
Is equivalent to 10 per cent increase
In the purchasing power of the wages of
the miners. Formerly everybody was paid
with orders on supply stores managed and
owned by the operators where every miner
had an account and bought what he wanted
on credit. At the end of the month, or
whenever payday occurred, he presented
his order and 1t was credited on the books
against the purchases he or his family had
made. This credit system was q great
temptation to the miners and their fam
Iies, who bought many things they did not
need and bought more than was necessary
OF what they did need because they did
not realize how much they were spending.
NOW that they receive their wages in ash
they can trade wherever they can get the
pest bargains, and as rule are much
In hnn
money. Mr.. Gompers things that 1t is worth
more than 10 per cent for miner to have
the privilege of handling his own money
and buying where he can use it to the best
advantage.
DESIRED kr Recognition.
With conditions 1 have described as al
most IDEAL prevailing throughout the an
thracite regions, 1t is perfectly natural to
ask why another strike Is proposed AL
most everybody I have questioned is en-
phatic In declaring at first that strike is
impossible. Then, after explaining thA nit