The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-05-11
Three New Books
on Labor Problems
BY F. PARKER STOCKBRIDGE.

definite shape than the insistence of the
workers for n larger share in the prod
ucts Of their labor. This insistencc is
manifcsting itself in America in count
less ways. 1t is not yet an organized
force in this country, as it has already
become in England, still less do those
most closely in touch with the minds of
American workers foresee any such mani
feStation Of this new urge rs is exhibited
in Russia. He would be vcnturesOme
prophet who would undertake TO predict
how far American labor may eventually
60 with its demands for voice in the
management and share above wages in
the profits of industry. American EN-
ployers, many of them, are studying
the situation with care and endeavOr-
lations with their employees as 10 fore
stall a social and industrial revolution.
And already there is considerable litcra-
ture dealing with these experiments, all
VI ~ DuScu Wi
ance by its authors Of the belief that
radical rcadjustmcnts in the relations
between those who toll with their hands
and those who control and direct their
labor are an essential part of the immc-
date programme of reconstruction.
In Labor and Reconstruction IN Europe.
by Elisha NJ. Friedman, which carries
an introduction by William y. Wilson,
L. S. Secretary Of Labor, there is pre-
scented FOR the general reader survey
of the labor situation principally in Eng
land and in Germany. Great Britain is
facing an industrial crisis The problem
is being approached in n conciliatory
manner by the Government, and many
volunteer agencies are cooperating in the
effort to bring about situation uat
will enable British industry TO function
even more efficiently than in the past,
and at the same time give the workers
a return for their labor that will satisfy
them. Mr. Friedman gives the most COM
prehensive report that has yet been pub
lished in America of the different ap-
proaches to the English labor problem.
His discussion of the labor situation in
Germany, in view of current reports of
the rapid advance of Bolshevism in the
Central Empires, is manifestly not up to
date, rs it deals exclusively with the pro-
gramme begun under the Hohenzollern
Government, which has undoubtedly been
substantially modified since the end of the
war.
In The Turnover Of Factory Labor
Sumner H. Slichter deals with q single
phase of the industrial problem, which,
however, has distinct relation to the
entire question of the relations of en-
ployer and employee. The labor turn
over, by which is meant the proportion of
the total average number of employers
that must be replaced annually in order
to keep an industry fully manned, runs
up in many eases to above 100 per cent;
TINT is to say, plant employing thou
sand mcn may have TO hire as many as
n thousand new hands every year TO re-
place those who leave through discharge
or resignation. Manfcstly this touches
the very roots of the labor question. Men
do not leave employment in which they
are contenled; men are not discharged
who are competent, under normal condi-
tons. Mr. Slichter, whose work is in
troduced by Professor John r. Commons,
has analysed all the contributing factors
that cause she labor turnover, and points
out, with illustrations drawn from actual
experience, that this tremendously ex-
pensive handicap is not experienced in
establishments where the workers are
dealt with and regarded as individual
human beings and paid and otherwise
treated accordingly. That is perhaps a
broad and hasty generalization, but in the
main it covers the range Of remedies for
the labor turnover which the author sug