The Connecticut labor news., 1921-11-18
Employees F breed to Submit by Near Star vatiOn After Long Unemployment a Il d Winter Near - Win chester's May Be Put on Piece Work.

A break i'll the unemployment situation, which break was con- fidentIy expected by workingmen as soon as>the employers felt that they had "starved' the workers into subjection and the taking of any wage offered, was noted this week when Winchester and a number of other big shops about the city began calling in their help. While large numbers of them are returning, they are do- ing so not because they are satis- fled with conditions offered but because solely they have to. With winter nigh and families to sup port, the exchequer exhausted by the long period of unemployment; the worker Is forced to accept whatever wage the manufacturers are offering and from the. figures being quoted to the workers, the employers are taking a hoggish advantage of their condition.
 The uniformity of the rates of fered also leads to the more than suspicion that the manufacturers are acting in concert on the wage scale, the general scale being 29 or 30 cents an hour for machine hands and a maximum of 38 cents an hour for skilled mechanics. A working week of 55 hours is be- ing established which would give the 29 cent man $15.95 cents a week and the 38 cent man $2O.9O, truly magnificent sums to keep a family on these days of high prices.
 Take the case of Winchester's as an example Through notices pub lshed in the newspapers and personal suramons to those who could be readily reached, the former employees were notified that business was to be resumed and groups of employees put to work daily At once applicants galore responded and were told to go to work at the same time being in formed of the new wage scale. The long period of idleness and high ex- pense for living caused the workers to accept 1t, many of them throwing up temporary jobs they had secured at even better pay, under the belief that their old jobs al Winchester S would pay them better.
 In addition, according to reports being circulated among the men al ready at work, as soon as operations get somewhere near normal, the en- tire shop even to the foremen and petty bosses is to be put on a piece work basis, the rate to be fixed to be d figure that would result in about the same weekly wage. The only time foremen and other employees will be paid on an hourly basis is to be when the foremen are actually en- gagged in making up payroll or piece work reports and other workers when taken off regular piece-work jobs and put on some emergency or other word for which piece work prices cannot be arbitrarily fixed. The result of this, if the report is follow ed out, will be that the foremen, tc make a good weeks pay for himself will drive the machine operators tc the highest pitch and result in more production for the shop if it doesn't in any more pay for the workers.
 According to further reports from the 'inside' of the factory, in other departments, aside from the gun anc cartridge shops, there are, enough orders ahead to Keep the shops run. ming on full time for year and one half. These orders are said to have been on hand for sometime but have been held up in starting by the fnan cial situation. With the adjustmen this week of the financial affairs L K. Liggett, one of the largest inter csts in this part of the shops, it i: expected that work will now go or in the other lines and be the req reason for the resumption of work il the gun and other shops.
 Winchester's is not the only factor,