Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1907-04-25
The Strawpile
Hired Man Question.

Hired Man Question.
| The hired man question IL Il hard
one under present conditions. Farm
crs kick because they cannot ge, hired
men to work for the same sum per
| month az of old; but farmers. like ev-
| erybody else. must learn TO take con-
| ditions as they come and not try to
| force things back where they We're.
| In other words, we must keep UP with
the procession Conditions are con-
stantly Changing and We must try to
accommodate ourselves to the changes.
! TEN aud twelve years ago men were
| willing to work at almost anything in
the way Of manual labor for one dollar
| Il day ana board, or even less. while
| the same aborers today can get TWICE
that ut many kinds OF labor in many
places In the United states. and with
only nine to ten hours work This
state of things Is due to different
causea One of these causes is the or
ganszsGtlon OF laboring men into ur-
!, ions. The other great cause Is the In
crease In the supply of money. AS the
money supply becomes greater, the
price, measured In all products OF la
Dor, and In labor, comes down; or, in
other words. the price OF all products
measured in money! comes up. The
natural law OF supply and demand APP
plies just as fully to money as to any
other commodity. The price of farm
products should rise just as surely as
should the price of labor or the price OF
farms, or the price Of flour. or the
price Of rents.
y
Instead OF trying, as some farmers
do. to keep the price of farm labor
down. we must organize and keep the
price OF farm produce up so that we
may be able to pay good wages to our
hired men and still make q respectable
profit upon our produce. Because the
other fellows combine to beat US down
on our prices Is no reason why we
should combine to beat down the hired
men. If we are going to fight anybody,
let usl fight the fellows who beat us,
and mot the next fellow below US. BY
asking and getting fair prices for our
produce we will be enabled to pay our
hired men good wages. Another thing
we do not want to overlook Is that
hired men are people-just like the
rest of us. We are all made OF the
same clay. and the hired man may yet
be president OF the United States. A
good many men who are now in busi-
ness for themselves were once hired
men on the farm. and 1t did not hurt
them in the least and what are we,
anyway? We are all Of US working for
other people to some extent and for
pay. 1t is just as honorable to work
for money direct as 1t is to work to
produce something to sell for money.
The man who produces may feel Mt-
tie more Independent than the man
who works for wages, but often he is
not half SO much So. 1t Is often the
case, too, that the hired man, IL he
practices economy, can save more in
year than the farmer who hires him,
and simply because laborers are or
ganiEed and get what they demand,
while farmers must take what they can
get. The hired man produces wealth
just as surely as the man who owns
the land, and he is entitled to his share
of the product of his labor. 1t is true
that sometimes he grumbles about not
getting his proportion when he gets
more than that The hired man should
remember that the farmer has prob
dOIy SpSIil ySGtiS Va iilS AAAC w PeAS III
the farm and the stock and to get in a
position to make more than living,
and he is entitled to something more
than the product Of his own labor for
the current year. In other words he is
reaping pay for years of hard labor
when he realized very little, If anything
more than a living.
The best way to get along with the
hired man is to treat him as if he We're
an equal. You don't need to let him
run the place, but If you consult him
and let him do things his way, IL 1t is
a good way, he will take more interest,
and it is worth money to get a man
who does feel an interest in every
thing. If you can get hired man that
says "our hogs" and ''our horses" he
is worth two of the ones who always
say your hogs and your horses"