Mexico Missouri message., 1918-08-01

In 1913, add 81 week. Tnis Is not
my estimate, but is official.
Now, we are apt to say in this coun-
try that Germany lived as well on her
wages as we did on ours, but anyone
who has studied the facts finds that
this Is fallacy. In 1910 two-thlrds Of
the people In Chemnltz lived in apart
ments of three rooms or less. Chem
nitz has n population Of $4,000.
found in the New York public H..
brary interesting documents showing
results of investigations of Euro
pean costs of living. In Chemnitz in
1910 1t was costing a family of six
persons between 81 and SS week for
food, including beer to the extent Of
80 cents. Meat, fish, and sausage ag-
gregated S2.25.
These figures represented the plane
of living of high-spirlted workman,
very much better than the average.
Eggs cost at the rate of 25 cents for ID
and coffee was % cents a pound. He
used butter, cheese, milk, and bacon,
and grew some Of his vegetables in his
garden. Sometimes the family ate
hOrse1esh.
Women Garry the Hod.
Food and rent together cost him
more than 50 a week. For coal he
paid over SO ton.
His income tax-and II was time
Of peace, emember-amounted to
about 500 to the state and munich
pality together, while his other taxes
were between $40 and SIS.
After paying for his living and for
such meager amusements as he found
in an occasional visit to n cheap show
or concert, or perhaps trip with his
family to the park, he was able to save
only $50 year.
Every document l found, and every
statement made to me by Americans
who had managed great plants in Eu-
rope or had labored there, utterly dis
proved the theory that European
wages were relatively as high as
American. For the average man to
get ahead financially in Germany was
practically impossible.
in this country any form of govern
ment contributory to the grinding
down of our people to the state of
hopeless submergence.
Now glance at Vienna, where women
were hodcarriers when the war be-
gan-and had been all along. saw
them myself carrying bricks up long
ladders, and I was shocked at the
sight.
In Vienna the skilled artisan Csu-
ally lived in a couple of rooms several
floors up, on an income that did not
exceed Sc or 81 a week. Most of
these workmen had fair-slzed families,
and for a group of five or six the food
cost alone was around $3.50 a week
and even then they sacrificed eggs and
butter, and, to n large extent, meat.
All the rest of the income ordinarily
was eaten up by the rent, leaving moth
ing for clothing and general expenses,
and Ii was the custom of these fam
lilies to take In unmarried men as
dodgers. With the stipend thus re-
ceived and at a sacrifice of all ap-
proach to domestic comfort, 1t was
possible to keep away from abjeet
poverty.
Difference in America.
In Vienna plasterers earned $1.10 a
day, and plumbers $1.20; painters,
$125 or less; pattern makers, $3.50 a
week; leather workers, toy makers
bone workers, musical instrument
makers and tailors, $4 to So a week
Blacksmlths earned So week; brew.
ers and millers SO to 50; shoemakers
in factories, SO to $4.
These, remember, were skilled work
ers. There were swarIns of unskllle(
hands laboring from 10 to IL hours &
day for wages that ranged from GC
! TO 80 cents.
l might go on citing these figures
| indefinitely. The evidence is over
whelming. Ia America we have riser
so far above such industrial condl
tions that we cannot compare them
| The American workman, as a class
has asserted himself, claimed hi!
rights, and proclaimed himself q man
There are industries, CT course, where
conditions are not all they ought to be
but even here the same truth hold.
| good. However downtrodden an!
workman may consider himself in thi
country, he is n free man as compared
with the lower Industrial workers o
Germany and Austria. His oppor
tunities to get out of bondage are al
most unlimited here, and depend oI
his determination to study and maxi
himself capable of better things. Owe
there, workmen are up against cast,
and customs and against laws tina
are wellnigh insurmOuntable.
Let us decide, then, once and TO
all, that we aren't going TO have Amer
lean Industries Germanized.