The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1920-12-24
Industry'S Sex
Distinction Declared
Removed By War
BY LILLIAN ERskINE

by LILLIAN EHSktNE
Those of us who are honest in weigh
ing the factors of success in the speed
ed war industries of a dozen countries
know that their production charts def
nitely wiped out sex distinction not
only in the munition plants, but in the
standard industries of peace as well.
To inject sex distiction into contem-
porary labor problems is to befog is
sues which concern the nation. The
| floodtide of rising wages and the stead
lily ebbing waterline of working hours
have left the sands of the labor world
strewn with the fiotsam and jetsam
of past employment traditions. AS a
nation consuming more than it is will
ing to produce and spending more than
it is ready to earn, America is today
concerned with no more vital problem
than that of the relation of the worker
to his work.
The position of women in industry
today differs not one jot from that of
men, in that in the hands of both rests
the solution of how the streams Of
adequate wages and bettered indus
trial conditions shall be fed from
dwindling spring of national produc-
tive capacity.
We shall do well to discard the fall
lacy that the world conflict has revo-
lutionized the relation of employer and
employee. Yet no phase of the war was
more readily accepted by the public
than that declaring that our industries
were confronted by wholly new con-
ditions. Reduced to its last analysis,
the press featured the fact that women
were earning living wage on the
lathe of the machine shop, in the La
boratory of the chemical plan and in
the cab of the overhead crane. The
relation existing between productive
efficiency and the standard layout of
the machine shop and the question of
ventilation, lighting and safeguarding
were no different than before the war.
What, then, is new The work? The
danger?
Since the secret of production lies
in the managers Office rather than
in the workroom, it might be argued
that the character or sex of the EN-
ploye is matter of small concern.
But successful business must always
be based upon the spirit of co-opera-
ton within the industrial organism.
The working ability of women. ttere-
fore, may prove less determining fac
tor in assuring their retention upon
the payroll than their conservatism,
their conscientiousness, their normal
dislike of conflict and their adaptabiI- l
ity to their working environment
To proclaim them the equals of men
as productive units throughout the
the range of industry is as inaccurate
as it is nonessential. No one, however,
can question the superiority of women
in an infinity of processes calling for
delicacy of touch, quickness of percep-
tion, painstaking accuracy of adjust
ment or taxing the subconscious ply
steal reactions associated with the
monotony of automatic processes.
The salvation of industry is now
based on the elimination of all physi-
cal handicaps to the well-being of
every employee as a prerequisite to a
productive efficiency which must not
only be sustained but accelerated as (
well, if we are to avoid the defeat. Of
peace.
AS long as the women in industry
demonstrates her ability to balance
her earnings by her sustained output
not only in her retention on the pay
roll assured, but she will find also a
steadily broadening range of oppor-
tunity-Philadelph Ledger.