The Washington times., 1916-12-12
THE BYRNS SALARY IN
CREASE AMENDMENT

mittee has adopted the Byrns sub
committee amendment. to increase
certain of the lower grades of de-
pertinent salaries. II may be pre-
sumed that there is q good chance
for the measure to become law.
Probably il represents the minimum
that may be expected by way Of bet
ter treatment for the Government
clerks. A fair and thorough pres
entation of the merits, in House and
Senate, ought to result in a more
adequate advance than is here pro-
vided, though the civil service work
ers have occasion to be grateful even
for small consideration.
It is provided by the Byrns
measure that salaries "under 81 200
per annum shall be increased 10 per
cent for the fiscal year 1918; that
10, the year beginning July ! next
and ending June 80. 1918. 1t is
not a permanent increase; without
affirmative legislative action it
would not continue after this one
year, but instead the ancient and
outworn salary schedule would be
automatically restored. This is the
first highly Objectionable feature. II
the measure is to be regarded as
merely an emergency provision, it
ought to take cognizance Of the fact
that the emergency is here right
now. People need increased incomes
during the winter vastly more than
they will need them next summer. IL
legislature is to assume that presr
ent high prices are only an incident
Of a year, it would be well to admit
that they ought to be dealt with
while they are high, not afterward.
But there are other objections to
this provision. Salaries under
$1,000" are to be increased 10 per
cent; which means that the big class
Of people getting exactly 81 200 will
not receive the 10 per cent advance,
but only 8 per cent.
II happens that there are very few
salaries between $1,000 and $1,000.
Large numbers are in both these
classes, and the effect is to allow the
10 per cent advance, practically, to
those drawing 81 900 and under. So,
in effect. the largest increase is 500
q year.
Above $1,000, then, and up to ST.
500. the increase will be 8 per cent.
Thus the 81 800 clerk will get an in
crease Of 500, while the $40 mes
senger will be raised only $54. Which
Of the two most needs the larger
increase? The $500 employe is
almost an aristocrat, in this patheti-
cslly underpaid service. He needs
and ought TO have more; bat does
he need IL more than the $40, the
$500, and the s720 classes? As
suredly he does not.
A percentage scheme OF increases
n not what is needed II would be
vastly more to the point to establish
q point below which no wage should
20, and then TO distribute the ad-
ditional wage fund in such manner
a. TO insure that the lower grades
should be raised, first Of all. to the
assurance Of a fair living basis.
After that the highest classes should
be given whatever is left.
The Byrns amendment will help,
and help a good deal. Bot it is not
sound in principle, gives no perma-
nent relief, and leaves unsettled a
question that in simple justice should
be settled. and settled rightly. with
out delay. The whole salary sched-
ule of the departments should be
made over with view TO dealing
honestly with conditions as they are,
not as they were two generations
ago when that schedule was adopted.
Comparatively speaking. the wages
Of the Government employees shrink
with every advance of incomes for
other people. Just in proportion as
the mass of earners are better able
to pay higher prices, II is more diff
cult to keep prices from advancing.
The increase in the weekly and
monthly distribution of the wage
fund inevitably means expansion of
the circulation. 1t means freer
utilization of the increased gold and
credit stock of the country, and
that, whether it be called imitation or
something else, involves an unavoid-
able tendency to increase prices, or
to prevent their reduction.
Thus does the necessity for
sweeping increase of Government
clerks salaries become positively as
we'll as comparatively more neces-
sary with every passing week. The
situation grows increasingly hard
for people who these two decades
have been underpaid, and living in
conditions that made it harder and
harder to induce ends to meet.
Congress certainly will not refuse
to take copnizance of this position,