Mohave County miner and our mineral wealth., 1919-08-16

I cease. The total wages paid for the calendar year of 1918 was $2,58i,- SS4,559. The number of hours work ed during the year was 1929, ,185,725. The total increase demanded under the brotherhood plan would mean about $800,000,00O and the bonus through the retroactive application of these contracts from January 1, 1919 would reach the grand total of S465.- 100000. The increased wage for the year, added to the bonus demanded, would make a grand total of $1,265,- 000,000 and total per capita tax would be levied against every man, woman and child in the entire United States, of $12.65 which would mean to the average family of five persons an excess of $63.00. This tax would be levied against 9S% of the population of the United States for the benefit of the other 29o.
 The number of railroad employees in the United States previous to the Gov ernment control was 1,723,734. They received in wages $1, ,730, ,057, ,342. The increase in 1918 from 1917 in the per- centage of employees was 5.6. The ip- crease for wages alone in 1918 over 1917 reached s5,S27,217, and the 96,. 926 added employees increased the av- craze hours of work but 4.6. The in crease of employees under the 8-hour day law is accompanied by an increase in traffic represented by 2.7% in- crease in revenue ton miles and 8% in revenue passenger miles. In 1918 there was a total decrease of 5.3 in the total train mileage, while February 1919, as compared with Decembr 1917, showed a total increase ih employees of 8@o and decrease in the total hours of 4%. In other words, ac. cording to the statistics of the Rail- way Administration, the increases in employees alleged to have been caused through an establishment of the S. hour day and the increase in wages alleged to have been necessary to meet the increased expenses of living, have resulted in decrease in efficiency. According to the evidence developed in the hearing this week before the Con- gressional Committee, plans are being made to raise by subscription or other wise, money to the amount of $2,5OO,- 900 and "ten million if necessary" for the purpose of educating the public to the so-called Plumb Plan of opera tion of the railroads, which will not be purchase of the railroads of the United States, but in effect and in fact, seizure by Congress at the be- hest of less than 100000 railroad men backed by 2,5OO,OO0 additional members of the Federation of Labor and the installation of communicate theory of management in the opera tion of public utilities.
 There is reason to believe from the public and private utterances of the officials of the railroad brotherhoods that unless labor,s program is granted, paralysis of the railroads is to be ex- pected, with it's attendant breakdown of all commerce and industry. For mer President A. G. Garretson Of the Brotherhod denies that there is such plan, a contradiction of previous published statements.
 The American Mining Congress re- gently called the attention of it's mem bers to the existing danger of gen eral shortage in industrial coal. That warning was based upon careful in- vestigation of the transportation situ- ation. Of the 240,0O0 cars idle through being in unserviceable condi- ton, about 90,O00 were the open top coal car type. The Railway Admini- stration had already realized the situ- ation and had placed the railway shops on the full working basis and had already entered into outside con tracts for the repair of several thou- sand of these cars in order that coal could move when the full shipment be- gan. It called attention to the fact that the coal operators were helpless in the matter and to the necessity of having a continuous movement of cars into. and out of the mine yards to dispehse of the coal removed by the miners The psychological time to threaten national strike was se- lected and the men are confident that President Wilson will grant the wage increase and bonus asked for as a means of preventing civil war.
 The American Mining Congress does not wish to discuss with its mem- bers the merits or demerits of the Plumb Plan of Railway operation. Government control of the railroads up to this time, has been sufficiently costly to furnish a final argument on this point. But it agrees with the leading editorial writers of the United States who are united against the present revolutionary demands of the railway brotherhoods, that the broth erhoods have forced before the Con- gress of the United States and the business interests of the country, not the reduction of the costs of living as