The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1917-06-29
COMMISSION GIVES HIGH PRAISE
FOR LABOR ORGANIZATIONS

wages paid $50 cents a day on one
of the largest and richest), but even
more because these estates, embrac-
ing entire counties and towns, are
law unto themselves and the abso-
Lutte dictators of the lives, liberties
and happiness Of their employees. 1t
is industrial feudalism in an eX-
IRENE form. Such estates are, as
rule, property Of absentee millionaire
landlords, who live in the Eastern
cities or in Europe.
Causes of Industrial Unrest
The sources from which industrial
unrest spring are:
/. Uunjust distribution Of wealth
and income.
>. Unemployment and denial of
an opportunity to earn living.
3. Denial Of justice in the crea-
ton, in the adjudication and in the
administration of law.
4. Denial of the right and oppor-
tunity to form effective organiza-
tiOnS.
Unjust Distribution of Wealth and
Income
The conviction that the wealth of
the country and the income which is
produced through the toll Of the
workers is distributed without regard
to any standard Of justice, is as
widespread as it is deep-rooted. 1t
takes every form, but at bottom
there is one fundamental, controlling
idea that income should be received
for service, and for service only,
whereas, in fact, it bears no such re-
lation, and he who serves least, or not
at all may receive most.
What do the millions of workers
get for their toll, for their skill,
for the risk of life and limb? That
/ is the question to be faced in an
industrial nation, for these millions
are the backbone and sinew of the
state, in peace or in war.
One-thrd of the adult male work
ers, the fathers and potential fathers,
earn less than $40 a week, between
wo-thrds and three-fourths earn
less than SIS, and only about one
tenth earn more than $40 a week.
The mere pittances paid to women
and children for their work are not
only insufficient for their support,
but through the force of competition
in rapidly extending field they
threaten the whole basis of the
wage scale.
One-half of the women workers
earn less than six dollars a week.
Six dolars-w what does it mean to
many? Three theatre tickets, gaso-
lne for the week, or the price of a
dinner for two; pair of shoes, three
pairs of gloves, or the cost of an
evening at bridge. To the girl it
means that every penny must be
counted, every normal desire stifled.
and each basic necessity of life bare
ly satisfied by the sacrifice of some
other necessity.
Last Of all are the children for
whose petty addition to the stream of
projection the nation is paying a
heavy toll of ignorance, deformity
of body or mind, and premature old
age. After all, does it matter much
what they are paid. For all eX-
perience has shown that in the end
the fathers wages are reduced by
about the amount that the children
earn.
This is the condition at one end of
the social scale. What is at the
other?
Massed in millions, at the other end
of the scale, are fortunes of size
never before dreamed of, whose very
owners do no know the extent, nor
even the sources, of their incomes
We have, according to the income
tax return, forty-four families with
annual incomes of $1,OOO,OOO or more,
whose members perform little or no
useful service, but whose aggregate
incomes, totalling at the very least
fifty millions per year, are equiva-
lent to the earnings of 100000 wage
earners.
The ownership of wealth in the
United States has become concen-
trated to a degree which is difficult
to grasp.
The "Rich," per cent of the peo-
pie, own 90 per cent of the wealth.
The Poor" IS per cent of the peo-
pie, own only per cent of the
wealth.
Effective action by congress is re-
quired, therefore, not only to read
just the existing injustices in the
distribution Of wealth and income,
but to check the growth of an heredi-