New-York tribune., 1919-05-02
Germany To-Day
Wilson the Messiah
Fourteen Points Regarded Honorable Drarv
By SAMUEL. CROWTF4ER
Special Correspondent The Tribune
Germany To-Day

really mean. This factor alone would be
enough to cause revolution in many coun-
tries. The money question is so bad that
in some parts the people employed are ask
ing that they be paid in food and not in
money. One mine that / visited in Silesia
has had no trouble with it's people because
they have been able out of their farms to
supply many articles Of food at low prices.
At the Krupp works the personnel mana
gers have taken care that the workers are
able to buy food at reasonable prices, and
IN consequence the Krupps have had COM
paratively little trouble with their own
people. All of the disorder (and there has
been very little of it) at Essen has come
from the outside,
The Variable Mark
In going about Germany one finds that
the purchasing power of the mark varies
Wldely, and although the Rhinelands have
always been expensive for the wo~kmen.
the prices there have not risen in COM
parlson, say, with Berlin or Hamburg:
while what they take as very EXPENSIVE in
Breslau would be held to be bargain in
Dresden This makes figures on wages of
almost no value, because the wages must
vary with the buying power, but generally
speaking the rises have been about 200 per
cent, and most of this has come since the
revolution, for it is since that event that
the prices OF food have gone up. Here are
some typical increases: Dock workers at
Hamburg who had $50 before the war now
receive ID marks a day; an unskilled
worker IN Saxony who formerly had from
~ to ~ marks for a week of nine to ten
hour days now gets from so to 80 marks
for week of eight-hour days; a Silesian
miner who would average marks day
before the war will now earn from 20 to
rs marks during the shorter day of eight
hours. The minimum wage in Krupp's now
is IL marks day. A machinist in the
Rhinelands who earned 1926 an hour be-
fore the war now gets marks, while the
wages of unskilled men in these trades
has jumped from go or 10 an hour to 1.5O
marks. About Berlin machinsts who had
40 marks week before the war now ask
for and get 80 marks a week; but these
same machinsts reached as high as $50
marks week during the war
And this illustrates one of the remark
able facts about German wages-and that
IS the dawning comprehension that it is
not the amount of money that one receives
which counts, but what that money will
buy. l asked many workers in all parts if
they hoped to hold their present wages. and
in every case they answered that they did
not think the wages could or should last.
but that they would be willing to 20 back
to the pre-war basis or little better if
only the prices of food and clothing would
come down. A start in this direction has
been made by reducing the unemployment
allowance in Berlin from to marks a
day and limiting the additional sums of
1.5O day paid for each child to three
children. The trade unions urged this de-
crease because they found that the high
unemployment payments removed all de-
sire to work. The wages offered. seldom
exceeded by more than mark or two the
allowance which a man with a large family
could have without work
The Danger Of Pressure
The unions are winning at the time Of
writing, but they are so engaged in the
winning that they have had no time to
work out plans or details. They took the
made and had been praised in England;
they have some ideas of making the powers
broader and of permitting the highest coun-
ellis to control the entirety of the industries
on a kind of gigantic trust plan But all
these things are yet in the distance The
important thing to remember about Ger
man labor to-day is that it is really anxious
to work and will take considerably lower
wage-wll adopt whole new wage plan
if only the general prices can be brought
down. And further-that it is willing to
adopt any kind of scientific management
which can be shown to increase production
without hurting the status of the working
man.
The other side Of the picture is that the
radical elements may grow in power-al-
though hardly to the point of control--if
any very great pressure is put upon Ger
many. pressure without propaganda would
defeat itself.
The efficiency of the worker In Germany
has lowered to a great degree during the
war, but that is something to be taken up
in estimating the ability of Germany to
compete in the worlds markets