White Pine news weekly mining review. [volume] (East Ely, Nev.) 1910-1920, 1913-07-06
WAGES vs..


From New York comes the report
of a voluntary committee of national
ly prominent social workers, who for
the past two months have been con-
Quoting an investigation into the al
legged relation of low wages to the
recruiting of the underworld. The
committee finds that injustice has
been done working girls, especially
to the employees of department stores,
by the widespread publicity given to
a mistaken view of industrial re-
spo~nsibility for the so-called white
slave condition"
1t is a significant document in that
it is a dispassionate statement of a
problem usually discussed in the heat
of partisan politics, or with the senti-
mentality of those emotionally in
capable of distinguishing between
ethic and economic factors. says the
San Francisco Chronicle. The mem
bers of the committee. though among
The foremost of enthusiasts for
social uplift. have expressed them
selves in terms at once judicial as to
the causes of the evil and sympa-
thetic to the victims both of low
wages and immortality. They say
Our sympathy is strongly with the
working girls in the matter of pay,
but that is a question to be con
sidered on different grounds"
In place OF money, which they say
strated as a direct cause of loss of
virtue. the investigators set down
weakness of mind and will. indiyidu-
al temperament, immoral associates,
lack of religious or ethical training,
injurious home influences. lack of
industrial efficiency, idleness. love of
fnery, ignorance and various other
factors as primarily responsible.
While this has been the tradition
al belief of most thoughtful people.
it has beer considerably disturbed by
politicians and misguided humani-
tarians keen to saddle every evil on
industrial conditions and obsessed
with the superstition that there is
not an i'll that flesh is heir to which
cannot be cured by legislative enact
ment.
This fallacy, pernicious In itself
since il is the source of laws which
often intensity the diseases they are
intended to cure, Is especially harm
full In the case of the social evil. 1t
not only the false hopes that
morality can be assured by higher wa
ges, and that higher wages can be
secured by legislative action. but ii
d~iseourages the activities of those
who are honestly and intelligently
working in the direction of social up
lift.
Morality is best stimulated by in
%dividual. personal and direct appeal.
and those who do the best work are
those who proceed on that principle
in their reformatiye activities. But
their task is made more difficult when
politicians protest that morality IS
only a matter of money and material
comfort. and that there is more po-
tency in laws than in philanthropie
and religious effort.
The New York committee says an
injustice has been done working girls
by declaring that their morality de-
pends upon the wages received. The
insult is far sweeping than that.
II embraces all womankind, since II
implies that the virtue of all women
is in the last resort an insumciency
of temptation. and that purely a
monetary one.
Advocates of wage regulation by
law may not see that this is an eff
feet of their theories. but that is due
to the fact that they are also unable
to foresee the economic results of
their proposals. 1t is not want of
gallantry so much as lack of intelli-
gence.