Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1912-02-09

facts, invite a like condition of affairs |
in our country?
Excerpts from DR.. Friedensburg' I
Essay-"In the very first year of acct
dent insurance QSS6) 1868 pensions,
amounting TO 1,547,593 marks tabout
$40000O), were granted; this included
indemnification for the most insig-
nificant injuries resulting in loss OF
three to five per cent of earning ca
pacity. But recently there has be-
come audible an increasing volume of
protest from large organizations,
worthy of respect in every way, that
authoritatively voice the complaints of
the tradesman, both small and great,
expressly denying from the very start
all hostility to workingmen's insurance
in the abstract; they show how grave
ly German industry is handicapped in
competition with foreign markets by
the cost of insurance, which can now
be characterized by nothing short of
monstrous. amounting, as it does, to
almost exactly 10000 marks (S5OO,-
O00) daily. If disregarding the bur
dens of taxation, we consider simply
the burdening of our industrial activ-
] ity with social assessments, we reach
| the result that even today the burden
of contributions to insurance caused by
this social policy alone amounts to nearly
S00,000,000 marks (s1G0,00O, 0OO) annu-
ally. We must therefore soon reckon with
a burden of about 1850, 100000 marks
| $3.50, 000,000) each year laid upon our
industrial activity simply and solely
for purposes of social insurance.
Unfortunately, the employers of
moderate or of scanty means are the
very ones from whom the contributions
act a percentage of running expenses
that becomes more and more oppres-
sive. Unlike larger firms. they are un.
able to recOup themselves by their
power to set prices, which are deter
mined independently of them: and, al,
, though relatively few companies have
thus far been heard from these circles
this is very possibly because the more
personal controversies between employ
er and employe, which in the labor
world are characteristic of the time
give rise to even more bitterness and
anger than these contributions to the
trades associations. Only recently the
Prussian minister of finance has showI
by actual statistics how the working
man submits to a taxation by his "col
leagues that would undoubtedly drive
him TO revolution if it were the state
that levied it. An additional factor i!
terror of the social democrats. and, il
pursuance of a train of thought tina
was vaguely felt by the original legis
lator, and which we shall conside
again at the close of our study, it wa
believed that the threatening perils O
social democracy might be averted b,
contributions toward the insurance
fnd-that the workingmen might b.
bought off, so to speak. from revolu
ton. The extreme unwillingness +
: incur disfavor with this party is clear
/. . ly shown by the attitude of a witnes
: in the Moabit riot trial, who, whe
asked If he belonged to it, first al
swered with decided denial. then d.
clared that he did. and ended by say
ing that he belonged to no party
Should there come times when on
industrial activity or even merely e!
sential parts OF it should no longer b
able TO meet the social obligation
legally imposed upon it, then Their
will be no alternative except for tn
state as the state TO assume those bu
i dens if it is TO avoid a catastroph
7 whose scope none can foresee even s
! far as social conditions will be col
= cerned.
"The question OF the degree OF ear
ing capacity still possessed by an II
: jured person is by far the most fir,
;. quent problem for decision. Yet eve
/ here-and again with entire Justice
p certain fixed principles have been d.
d veloped. as that the loss of an ey
% regularly entities a workingman
= from 80 TO 33 1-3 per cent of the pei
sion for complete loss of earning C
4, paoity. This very principle is che {
d those most constantly opposed. tn
4 trades associations have given the o
- fee long extracts from the payroll
a. which prove beyond all doubt thu
very many workin gmen-if not the m
10 jority of them-receive, after losing a
!. eye precisely the same wages as thos
u who have suffered no injury. and Z
ut they themselves did previous to the