Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-07-22
WANTED: REAL COMFORTER
FOR THE MODERN Mr.. JOB
The Average Man Who Isn't Cap
itaIist or an up-and-At.'Em
Unlonite Sadly Needs
Friend

which questions of prices, production
and industrial relations are being fought
out by delegations representing man
agcmcnt and organized labor.
The lively debate proceeds in an
inner circle. Outside. looking %oefully
in. is the general public. The people
know that the railway men have re-
! cciypd a comfortable raise-not what
they wanted, to be sure but who ever
gets all that he wants in this world?
IL past experience means sanything,
that money will not come out Of cor
poration dividends. Railway managers
are already asking for higher rates to
meet the increased expense. They might
better speak of higher indemnities.
Mr.. Piez. who knows q thing or two,
questions that general demand and OBJ
serves loudly that the rail corporations,
having been bottle fed by the govern
ment for two years. have lost their
initiative and their sense of RESPONSE
lbility. Railway executives are not lack
ing the gift of rcpartcc. They were
not slow to tell Mr.. Piez that milk
diet was fatal to the health and we'll
being of their companies. They want
damages.
So it goes in most of the highly or
ganiZed industries And what is plain
and growing palmer every day is that
neither the managers nor workers have
time to get back to normal standards
of efficiency because they are too busy
fighting each other to see who is to be
boss in the future world Of business.
There has been terrific slump in
railway earnings. 1t is due partly to
strikes and partly to executive def
ciencies. The vast volumes of freight
and express matter rejected or delayed
under embargoes and bans represent
untold millions that might have gone
into the railway companies treasures
without much perceptible increase in
overhead charges. This loss may be
due to bad management, to labor dis
turbances. to car shortages, to the war
or to the whims of Providence.
The average man certainly had moth
ing to do with it, But the average man
must pay for it in the end.
All Massachusetts is upset because
the American Woolon Company sud
denly closed its plants and, without
warning, threw whole communities into
idleness. Mr.. Wood, president Of the
woolcn company, said that the shut
down was due to large cancellations Of
orders and n decreased demand for his
Output. Some Of Mr.. Woods critics,
remembering the astonishing prices re-
Gently asked for wOolcn fabrics. insist
that the action of the American Woolen
Company in this instance represents n
strike by a corporation for high prices.
This may be an extreme or even an
unfair view The disCOuraging thing
is that the man who soon will need an
overcoat has no means of knoyiDg the
rights or wrongs of the matter. What
he does know is that thousands of
skilled men and women who are ready
to weave woOlcn cloth are not permitted
to weave it and that expert weavers ere
now digging bitches for living. Such
state of affairs will suggest, even to
! the most casual observer, waste effort
and real economic loss.
/ The soft coal producers in Virginia
have issued a warning of midwjnter
coal shortage. They blame the AFRO
gancc of the miners and the miners in
turn blame the arrogance of the mine
owners.
Here again the citizen, who knows
nothing of the quarrel, is at loss. He
knows only that the price of coal is
creeping steadily upward.
4 clue to what is happening in the
MT n
the assertion of one of the coal opera
tors representatives, who insisted In
the presence of Senate committee that
n miner should be able to maintain his
family in comfort on wage OF $3.50
n dav. Now, every employer must
know that as matters stand that wage
i Inadequate for man with a wife and
children to support. But in this case
the mine operators were answering
propaganda with propaganda. They
issue extreme statements in answer to
extreme statements made by their rest
less antagonists in the mine unions.
Both groups are wasting their time.
They are following rule that prevails
too generally in the industrial world Of
today.
Men and managers alike ought to get
down to work.
Labor cannot boss capital. And any
one who supposes that capital can ever
again boss labor as it used to boss it
in the old days Is greatly mistaken.
But because each group hopes to OBJ
tain out of the present economic fer
ment an exclusive and permanent ad-
vantage over the other the reckless and
wasteful war goes on, production is i'm
pcdcd, prices go up, transportation sys-
tens are confused and irritation spreads
| throughout the country.
/ When the average American who is
neither a capitalist nor a life member
Of an up and at 'cm union realizes, as
| he is sure to realize before long, that
his life and his affairs will be governed
during the next few years by the force
/ of economic and industrial factors
rather than by the political abstrac-
| tions that crowd the minds Of all po-
litical parties and all candidates, he
will seek and find methods to curb the
two antagOnistic mnOrities whose fight
for power tends to make his life u
burden.
There are limits TO the patience of