Arizona republican., 1917-12-23

to produce up as IL IS necessary uurlHS the war To make up for the drain on skilled workers due to the hundreds of thousands we must send to France two steps must be followed:
 1. We must dilute skilled labor by use of men and women.
 ?. We must, wherever possible, sub Stitute women for men.
 England has had great deal of ex- perience in both Of these problems and her results are so satisfactory that very careful attention aIic study should be given not only to the problems but to the method by which England has handled them.
 The women that England has used for the dilution of skilled labor, and also for the substitution of men, have not been drawn entirely from the 1 poorer classes. They have not been | taken from the working ranks, but a | great proportion come from the good l homes of the land and thousands from the wealthiest homes. There are daugh- | ters of lords, earls and viscounts work i ing on lathes and other machines | alongside of daughters of grocers, 1 butchers, cobblers and day laborers 1 These women from the more educated homes are proving the best on skilled work, their careful attention exhibiting itself in their quicker adaptability to work as well as in greater care and accuracy.
 Great Britain has been forced to use all plans and devices in her diluation of skilled labor. The employment of women has made it necessary in many lines to establish schools in eonnec- tlon with the factories, these schools dnr- hA workers. In other industries it has not been necessary to establish such schools but the substitution of women for men on the simpler machines has been an easy transition.
 One of the best ezpositions of the dilution of skilled labor in England was that given by G. H. Baillie. member of the special mission of the Brush ministry of munitions, who has f been giving information on this im- portant subject in this country for = some time, MT. Baillie said:
 |, Our two schemes have been the di- . luton of skilled labor and the substitu- ton of women for men. One provision or that agreement was the abolition f Of all Jurisdiction limits, and another provision had the effect of abolishing " all trade union customs and practices ourlng the period of the war. The whole agreement, however, referred to S work on munitions only. Our employ f CTS made use of those agreements in s various ways. First, an unskilled work S CT was brought into the plant to do an easy job. The man so displaced was put on the more skilled work, and the e man displaced was again promoted n and so on until there had been an up- Is gradlng Of skill throughout the whole " shop.
 l. might give you an instance of Is that process which occurred recently y Ill steel works in Wales. The works iiao put up some new furnaces but the ministry was unable to supply either Skilled men or unskilled men for the Il extension The firm eoived its problem K oy taking on 67 women. The women IT 'hough' dld not work the furnace. Int e process was this: The women took th, ,e place of laborers in the plant: they die a loaolns and unloading and wheelins ana transporting of materials of al IS Ainus ana breaking up limestone, anC generally all the laboring work in tn, 1t piant that they could tackle The mel so displaced were put onto the simples Ill Jops In the works. They were mad n-hano melters and mixers an, e .iose men were promoted to be third lland meiters and mixers, and so tn sraoing-up process was continued ol the old furnaces until a sufficieu skilled staff had been obtained to Wor] and man the new furnace.
 , Another method adopted was f. draw unskilled men from the non-es sential trades. unskilled men who wer either over military age or of loy
 heoical category. Watchmakers wer brought into the tool rooms to do gag making. Our building industry wa largely closed down and we took sani tary plumbers from there and traine, them up to do lathe turning for our ex ploslve factories. We also drew iron the building industry carpenters an Jolners and sent them into the sh , yards to act as shipwrights and ship Jolners We took mechanics, textil mechanics, from the textile industries accustomed only to rough work an trained them up to the better work Q munitions
 "A third way was by confining tn fully qualified mechanic to the highes forms of skilled work. If the mecban nj normally had been on a job that couI
 De split up into two or more parts C varying degrees of skill, the mechani was confined to the part requiring tn most skill, and we trained up men an
 women to do the lesser skilled part
 AS an example of that process. I migf
 mention the making of snap, gages i
 the tool room. We commonly emulo
 women to make, harden and grind ii
 gages to within nearly their final lin
 Its, perhaps half thousandth of a
 inch, and we confine the skilled mt
 chanic to Nutting on the finishiu
 touch.
 That dilution helped us to a gre;
 measure in dealing with our shortae
 Of skilled labor, but before long prat
 tically all the useful men in the nor
 essential trades had either been draf
 ed into the army or had gone into Il
 munitions plants, and to meet our COT
 tinuaily increasing demands for nun
 tons, we had to rely upon the wome
 and We adopted the scheme of emplo,
 ing women for every job which
 woman could do or could be train,
 to do.
 It was agreed that a woman rnde
 taking work which previously had be,
 done by a skilled mechanic should r
 celve the same day rate as the skill,
 man; If she was on piece work, she ",
 to receive the same piece rate. It w
 only when she was on unskiIled
 semi-skilled work that the woma,
 wage could differ from that of t
 man, and then the wage was regulat
 by an order which fixed a minimu
 wage, a wage, roughly speaking. tw