The Knoxville independent. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1894-current, 1917-06-02
OvERWORK IS A
SOCIAL MENACE
The Long Day Is One Of the
Survivals Of a Past Age.
STRAIN ON THE WORKERS.

Serious Maenitude-Physical Exhaus-
ton Is Directly Responsible For Low
er Efficiency of Half the Population.
The long day is one of the most hide
GUS surVivals of a past age. In some
Industries, such as steel making and
railroad work, long hours are main.
tanned continuously throughout the
year. On the other hand, many indus
tries have rush seasons, during which
the factories work for abnormally long
hours and then do little or no work
in the slack season. The hours in the
steel industry are habitually long.
Whether the long hours be continuous
or intermittent, their result is the
same. Both involve overWork.
The strain of industrial effort upon
the worker depends, first, upon the
length of the days work and, second,
upon its intensity. Not only are hours
in American industry long, but they
continue long in the face of a rapid
increase in the industrial strain. A
score of devices are used to speed men
to their uttermost.
Within the last decade hours have
slightly decreased in the industrial
world, but with this decrease in hours
has gone an increase in speed. The
girls in the recent shirt waist makers
strike in New York complained that
instead Of watching one needle run.
ming as needles did ten years ago, at
the rate of 2,200 strokes minute, they
were now compelled to watch from
two to twenty needles on the same ma
chine, some running as high as 4,40C
strokes minute. The needles break
the thread catches, the material draws
"a dozen things happen, and, as the
work is piecework, every minute
counts. While the total number OF
hours may be less, the total vitality
expended on the work is necessarily
much greater because of the increased
concentration and speed required.
Fatigue is the product of the number
of hours Of work multiplied by the in
tensity of the work during each hour
In the steel mills of Pittsburgh "super
, intendent is pitted against superin
| tendent, foreman against foreman
! mill against mill When record ii
broken it means simply that the goa
to be struggled for has been Sc
| ahead"
Similar conditions exist in the textile
mills of New England. Years ago 6
woman tended two slowly running
looms. Later, as the hours of worE
grew less, the number of looms was
increased to four and six, and now
with some houses, an operative is eX
pected to look after from twelve tt
sixteen looms.
Oyerwork is a menace to industrial
social and personal welfare, because
it results in one of the most serious
and farreaching human maladies-fa
tigue. Fatigue, long continued, leads
inevitably to exhaustion; exhaustion
leads to disease, and then ultimately
to a death which is due to continual
| wearing, intense work. Overwork
with its attendant evils, thus becomes
problem of serious magnitude.
The waste of fatigue is far in excess
of the waste from illness, since fatigue
is directly responsible for the lower
efficiency of at least one-half of the
population.
Gripped by the stern necessity which
compels him to earn his bread, the
worker enters American industry and
caught in its levers and cogs, labors on
producing what he must, to earn what
he may. Society does not need the
extra goods which his weary fingers
| shape. There is one primary factor
upon which society must depend for it,
maintenance-that is, upon joyous en-
thusiastic men and women. There IL
neither joy nor enthusiasm in the vic
| tim Of the long day.
If the average worker in modern in
dustry was engaged in an occupation
of tense interest and broad value, eigh
hours might be too few, but the aver
age job is a dead job--monotonous
same to the point of madness. Could
you make the same motion 1000 times
a day and keep it up day after day
year after year, without growing
weary?
Was industry made for man or mar
for industry? There is one possible an
swer to that question. Every socia
institution was made for man; hence
when an institution ceases to serve
man and instead demands service Of
him that institution must either be re
formed or abolished" Men and womer
need not swork twelve hours day il
order to secure a livelihood for them
selves and for their families Since
| this fact has been established beyond
question, the long day has been weigh
ed in the balance, found wanting and
condemned to abolition. Yours. good
Samaritans, is the task of enforcing
this just sentence. Professor Scott
Npa ring