The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1916-11-22
PROFIT SHARING.

mas received the absolute endorsement OF
demonstration; and its growing acceptance
promises the only relief to the general pub
lie, caught as it were between two great
millstones, and made to suffer equally for
the strikes of one and the lockouts of the
other
The latest to adopt the plan is the I'm
derwood Typewriter Company, which will
distribute to the employees who have been
in its employ for two years or more, twenty
per cent of the final net surplus of each
fiscal year. This will amount to something
like 100000 this year. Employees can
likewise become stockholders and thus
virtually employers.
In June, 1915, the Calumet and Hec1a
Mining Company distributed a half million
dollar bonus among its employees; the
Hershay Chocolate Company distributed
$125,0OO in like manner; and the Locomo-
bile Company averted strike in July of
last year by the adoption of profit shar-
ing plan similar to that of Henry Ford :;
distributing $50 car among the en-
ployees when the output is fifty cars
week; seventy, $40; and hundred, $780,
The wage plan of the Ford Motor Com
pany is based on output, and is not based
on the hve-dollar-a-day minimum, as is
commonly supposed. The minimum wage
at the Ford plant for eight hours work is
$2.72, and under the profit sharing plan,
S2.28 IS added to the earnings
Ford, moreover, divided $10000O0O Of
the company's profits among its EMPLOYEES
in 1915; and is now shortening their hours
Of Ia hOr RI cix 1,o14~c
But more radical still is the profit shar-
ing plan of the Denison Manufacturing
Company, a Massachusetts, corporation
worth $6,0O0000, by which it proposes to
turn over its property to its 2,40O en-
ployees.
Under the plan, the stockholders, who
Hitherto elected the directors and ran the
company, are swept aside; though their
holdings amount to $4,5OO,OO0, they have
absolutely no voice in the company; they
became preferred stockholders, entitled to
draw eight per cent, and no more All the
common stock is turned over to the men
and women actually working in the plant
All share in the profits, but the manage
ment OF the company by stock voting is
restricted to those employees whose salary
amounts to 81 200 or over This stock is
not sold to the workers, it is given them
outright
Strangely enough the leaders of organ
lied labor oppose the profit sharing plan
! A report made public on April "a 1915, by
the welfare department of the National
Civic Federation analysed two hundred
such plans, and showed that in practice
they promote more continuous service, re-
duce the cost of production, secure more
Irregular attendance at work, build up con
f1dence, promote efficiency, encourage home
building, increase profits and pay higher
/ wages.
During the first year of the Ford profit
sharing plan, it was found that the en-
ployees living in poor conditions decreased
from twenty-three to three per cent
despite the fact that nearly 1000 more
men were added Since the plan went into
effect, moreover. Ford proft-sharers had
bank deposits of So, 056, 301 and life insur
ance totalling Sc, 493, 709-an increase O
$138.50 in the bank for each man, and O
$269.50 in life insurance for each man.
Bettering the condition of the seven mil
lion wage earners of the United States will
have a tremendous influence on the socia
happiness and development of the UniteC
States, and cheapening the price of com
modities, by lowing the cost of produc,
ton is Of immediate concern to everybod,
in the country. Profit sharing is coopera
ton, towards which the world has beer
striving ever since the first cave man en-
tered, with peaceful intent, the den of tn
second cave man to catch the philosophy
from heaven. To some it would sound Xix
/ anarchy to 1roe the con0erative control n