Mohave County miner., 1907-04-20
Notes of Mexican Mine Labor.

those articles and various conversa- tions that I have had with mining men lead me to believe that there has been and yet is prevailing impression that, while the wages of the Mexican miner are low, owing to his alleged lack of industry and mining ability, his work is expensive. Some phrasemakers once sad "Cheap labor means dear york;" and this principle, while doubt less true, is too often unthinkingly ap- piled. Cheap labor is expensive, but the question of cheapness is merely a local one. Because an American min- CT gets 3.5OS per day gold and a Mexi- can get 2S per day silver, it by no means follows that the Mexican is get ting low wages. It is forgotten that one dollar spent in the United States does not mean that it is equal to the expenditure of As. 2d. in England, or two pesos in Mexico. Two silver dol lars in Mexico will buy more of the necessaries of life than one dollar In gold in the United States, although the legal difference is only about two centavos. Hence to give Mexican miner the absolute equivalent of the wages of an American miner would be to overpay him. The fact is that cheap, in the phrase quoted, simply means cheap at the place of produc- tion, and in this sense cheap and poor are synonymous
 Depreciation of Mexican labor by American laborers often comes from a misplaced pride of race on the part of the latter, but the Mexican at IS is a man far more to be preferred than the Slav, Pole, or Finn at 3S; and, on the whole, as good, if not better man for the money than the so-called Ameri- can miner, as he is found today.
 On looking into the system now in vogue of employing the Mexican, we find him usually worklng on contract, where he is paid b. foot of advance, or by 'cuele,' as it is called, or else he is being paid by foot of hole drilled; that is speaking of the barreteros, or drillers; the peons or shovelers, and other unskilled laborers being paid by the day. The object is that of all con- tracts, namely, to pay only for results obtained. and so far has this contract system been carried out by Americans operal h. m Mexico that have even known them to pay so much per set for putting in timbers. This usually works so iavorably to the men that, when new company would commence operations, a man would not ask uSt for work, but for contract for any thing from bringing in a stray mule to driving tunnel.
 Some of the disadvantages of the cuele system are as follows: If the vein is hard, it will be avoided, and although apparently not important, the famous old Las Yedras silver mine stands as an example of where the ore Gin wide vein) was entirely lost in some of the lower levels, due to the necessity of paying by cuele. The miner will demand the right to point his holes as he wishes, with the result that they will not be placed in man. her to break well, and leave good floor. Again, by contract, after a short time the work is pretty liable to go slow, it being my experience that generally speaking, more than two Mexicans cannot long work peaceably together, but will quarrel and not hes itate to shirk responsibility for poor work, each on the other. Another dis advantage of letting contracts is one well known to superintendents of leas- ing mines in the United States, that is, the liability of the contractor to bring in class of men detrimental to the order of the camp, men that may have been black-listed by the company itself.
 The second method mentioned, or paying by foot of hole drilled, is, to me, far to be preferred; but the fol, lowing disadvantages are worth con- sidering. The holes will be placed so that they may be hit to the best ad- vantage and where the ground is soft est, which may mean that they will break the least ground and the ad- vance of the work will be small for the number of feet of holes drilled. In order fnr the holes tn he nrnnerl N