The New York herald., 1922-10-31
The Living Wage Theory

Every rational human being in this
country stands for wage that will
give American workers an American
living. But the United States Rail-
road Labor Board is right in holding
that the so-called Giving wage" does
not mean what those who advance the
theory in wage scale disputes pre-
tend 1t means.
in recent years, came into kind of
official designation at time when the
United States Department of Labor
was persistently misused in behalf
of the doctrines and schemes of trade
unionism. The living wage" inven-
tion of the trade union propagandists
and their allies in the United States
Department of Labor was created out
of number of fallacies, inaccuracies
and misstatements that were treated
by them as If they were truths and
facts.
One OF these was the assumption
that the desires and needs of millions
of workers are very generally identi-
cal. Another was the ignoring of
the fundamental and striking differ
ence between the man Of thrifty
nature and habits and the man of
wasteful nature and habits. Still
another was a sheer miscalculation
based both upon the average number
of members in family and upon the
average number of earners in that
average sized family. The living
wage" theorists in this case put too
many persons in the average family
and let nobody but father work to
support that family.
On such false foundation the trade
union statisticians out of and in the
United States Department Of Labor
built up the impossible theory that
the American worker must have for
the decent and wholesome support OF
those dependent upon him several
hundred dollars a year more than
the earnings of ordinary workers are
or ever have been--more, in fact,
than the whole production Of the
country could provide on any such
division of earnings. And nothing
could better illustrate the economic
grotesqueness of their living wage
theory than what was done with it
in the Government service. While
the theory was sponsored by the
United States Department of Labor,
with voluminous reports and count
less bulletins, the United States Con-
gress would have none of 1t in max
ing appropriations for Government
employees The United States Gov
ernment would have none of 1t In
recommending and fixing pay for its
own employees, and the United States
Department Of Labor itself did not
apply its own theory Of the living
wage to its own payroll. So much
for that
AS for the living wage in its true
sense, it is a self-evident fact that
when there is employment for all
with a growing demand for labor
commensurate with the growing OPP
GRAFTON OF industry and business
there must be high enough wage
for workers in given community
and In a given industry to care
for them or the workers there will
shift to another community to OBJ
tain what Is waiting for them there.
/ But IT is equally a self-evident fact
that what is a living wage" in
one part OF the country could not
be such a living wage, might not
even approximate such living wage
in another part of the country where
rents, coal and light we're half again
as high as in the first instance, where
food was dearer. where there was a
substantial transportation cost OF get
ting to and from work as against
none at all in the first instance. where
clothing expense was greater because
OF climatic seventies, &c.
And in particular nothing worse
ever happened to the railroad work