New-York tribune., 1918-03-29

was convinced that practically all Of
ehem were lncipient slackers.
In MS statement of the company's
posielon Mr. Carse practically comedies
,, .na, the company is employing un-
/ skilled men for skilled work. but uses
the concession 10 ATTEMPT flank T M es
ment;; He argues that the yard is
merely a place where ships are as
s,embed, put together, and should not,
therefore, be put in the same class
concerning labor classification and wage
sehedules as ordinary shpyards. He
says mat the company took black
smith and sent him to the training
school at Newport News to be trained
as teacher. When he returned he
took a crew of green men who had
never seen hot iron before ard in ten
days, without spelling a pound of ma
terlal, had made them more productive
IN turning out ship shapes than The
average so-called skilled crew, and that
now this and other crews of amateurs
are each completing in a single day all
the frames required for one ship.
The company's contention is that if
1T were tied down by rigid schedules
and classltications it would not be pos
slble, or at least economical, to take
common laborers and educate them IN
this manner. If labor is so scarce as
| has been claimed, the possibility of
utilizing previously unskilled labor in
such an expeditions manner is of
prime Importance to speedy shipbuild-
ing The unions, however, contend
that as things now are this process is
merely taking bread out of the mouths
OF good workmen of proved compe-
tence to give it to bartenders and jew
ellers who are lodging the draft.
Only Way to Get
Labor to Speed Up
AS has been pointed out before, the
submarine people maintain that the
only practical way to get labor to
speed up is to avoid rigid wage sched
ules according to classes and to treat
employees as units, increasing pay and
advancing men to higher classes of
work according to their merits, thus
giving every man a substantial inter-
est in doing more and better than the
minimum that will hold the job. This
plan also gives them a mobile force,
as they can shift men around from one
class of work to another, according to
their abilities and adaptations when
they are not confined by a caste sys-
tenn of classification which limits the
field of work of man who has ac-
quired standing as certain sort of
craftsman If a regular iron worker
of particular sort is first a workman
and secondarily a workman of GER
tain designation, he can easily be
shifted to work that may be more suit
able to him; whereas, under rigid
classiticatlons, if man does not make
good or there is no longer work for his
particular classification, it becomes
necessary to discharge him. This, the
company maintains, is great and
cruel waste of labor at such time as
this.
Whatever the merits of this posi-
ton, it is regrettable that there is to
be no searching examination of it. The
Adjustment Commission feels that, in
the interests of general labor stabil
ity, it will be compelled to impose the
forthcoming wage schedule on the sub
marine plant. If the company's con-
tention is valid, this means that, in
order to maintain industrial tranquil
lity, it is necessary to slow up pro-
duction. Yet building ships is a job
that ought to be pursued with the
feversh intensity of soldier on
critical battlefield.