United labor bulletin., 1909-10-08

is not a guaranteed minimum, lnat mdHy
of the men have received pay far under
what they understood their rating to be,
and that foremen and superintendent
have refused to tell others what their
rating was. Further, it is alleged, that
where a lump sum is paid for series of
operations done by different gangs in
completing car, no money is paid any
of the gangs until the whole series of
operations is completed. AS some pools
have included many as 800 men, it is
manifestly impossible for the men to
keep track. Their pay envelopes show
on the outside merely the check number,
and the amount inside-neither the
mans rating nor the number of hours
he has worked, nor the hours due him
under the piece pool system, nor the
amount arbitrarily deducted from his
earnings by the company for insurance.
Rumors that foremen put dummy names
on the pool sheets have been current,
and the charges of graft which have
been common talk for years in Mckees
Rocks, are not of the sort to give the
men off-hand confidence in the account
ing department So far as checking up
their pay envelopes goes, they claim
they could be cheated out of their eye
teeth by the company-or by any dub
of a bookkeeper. And the company has
taken the position that if they did not
like what was in their pay envelopes
they could quit.
In the second place, the men charge
that the pool piece system as it has Deen
put in force in Sheen is a heads-I-win-
tails-you-lose proposition. The company
never stands to pay on a car more than
the fixed labor cost which it wants TO
pay. Thus, one gang may do its work
on a certain part. If another gang spoils
that part, the first gang loses also on the
spoiled piece. The POOLS paying for it
that is the cry in the mills. Here's a
gang foreman makes a mistake, said
one of the strikers committee to me-
Say he hasn't read his blue print proper
ly, and the gang has to tear out the
rivets. That's the fault of the company's
agent, isn't it? Well, the whole pool
has to suffer. l know of case wnere
Is or 20 sides of a car were misriveted
because the foreman made such mis-
take. 20 hell" he said, that's in the
pool" Another time. the centersills on
some cars for Mexican railroad had to
De cut apart to place the draw bars In.
The men weren't to blame, but it went
onto the pool. The POOLS got to right
all mistakes Again, say so men are
working in a pool. Every 10 men oper-
ate machine and one machine breaks
down. 1t may be the fault of the men
operating it, or it may be a flaw in the
, machine. In either case, their lost time
comes out of the pool. On the track sys-
tenn not one gang, but all would be held
up; and the pool would lose. The same
if there's a shortage of material. These
are the mems charges. Officers of the
company told me that they didn't have
shortages of material, that parts of the
machines could be quickly replaced, 9nd
that if there was a long tie up of gang,
it would be laid off so the lost time
would not fall on the whole pool. Presi-
dent Hoffstot, however. when l put the
case of the so men, five machines and
one broken, to him, could see nothing
unjust in making the 40 other men bear
the lost time instead of the company.
!, They want all the fat and none of the
lean with it, he said. Those were part
of the terms under which man was en-
ployed in the Pressed Steel Car COM
pany. The inference here again was
that if he didn't like it, he could quit.
Besides not knowing what money
was coming to them, and feeling that the
company was taking some that was
theirs, the men were sore at what they
individually got. Here was a man with
five years experience. who claimed he
drew out of the pool the same pay as a
greenhorn, no matter how much work he
turned out there machine runner on
a still machine who two pays ago re-
ceived less than the heater boy who
worked with him; here again men run
ming the same machines, the same hours
and drawing different pay. The strikers
committee collected large number of
pay envelopes, showing the amounts re-
ceived and taking the mems statements
as to the number of hours they had
worked. Some of these cases were pub
lished. and the company in reply stated
that its books showed the men worked
less time than they claimed The men
had no books.
This wage trouble was not in any
one group. 1t ran from yard laborers
up. pressman, who had been five years
in the works, told me he earned $50.
$55 and $50 fortnight under the old
system. His last few pays ranged from
s22 to s2S.
Under the name of the Fidelity Land
company the Pressed Steel Car company
owns 200 double houses in Schoenville.
These rent for $12 a month for four
uall nj lato hut, tLa1 tor.