The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1930-11-21
7heCherry
" Where with sar
We tell the truth
about many things. sometimes pre-
foun0ly, sometimes nippantly,
sometimes recklessly. ...........

A steady, downward march of
wages, as compared with production,
is marked straight through the Pc
riod of the last decade by the United
States census.
This is not as dark and gloomy as
it sounds, but it points with accuracy
toward basic fault in our economic
organization.
The danger, with facts like this, is
that the high-hat chaps will play
around with the idea, producing all
manner of fantastic notions, while
the too-serious will find portents of
this, that and the other disaster.
What is found in the census figures
for the last ten years also can be
found in the same figures for the last
so years.
Compared with production, wages
have kept getting further behind
And yet, as people, we have kept
going forward.
/
That sounds like contradiction,
and it is, III part, but it is not COM
plete contradiction. That's why we
haven't had worse -convulsions.
Our industrial plant has been so
prolific that the total stream of out
put certainly could be larger, profits
could be more generous and yet the
masses of the people could have more
than they had in the "good old days"
of hand labor.
But, looking at the figures, we come
up to this question: How long can
this thing continue, with safety to the
social structure?
Nobody knows the answer to that.
But everybody who is willing to
consider humanity as a valuable
thing knows that it is desirable to
create equity where there is inequity.
The existence of inequity is estab-
lished. Then why not proceed?
There is much evidence that pow
erful men among employers are look
ing at matters today from a much
more human and humane point of
view than ever before, that they con-
slider justice as more desirable thing
and that they more freely admit the
injustice of what is going on today.
BY that much we have gone ahead.
The chance is, however, that mat
ters will be measurably righted for
} the time being before there can be
any very marked achievement
wrought out of this new state of
mind.
What we shall have gained will be
little headway in the matter of
sentiment and conviction and there
will be that much less ground to be
fought over when another depression
comes.
For another depression will come.
The next depression Will not De so
long in coming, and it will hit harder
and perhaps more suddenly when it
does come.
That is clear, if we look at the fig
ures that show the constant growth
of the space between wages paid to
workers and the total value of output.
The future is on the lap of the gods
and most of the human race can only
wait and let it happen.
What we know today is that there
is no good to be achieved by losing
our sense of proportion, our sense of
values and our understanding of
where to work for betterment
Not out of the rare, upper strata
of metaphysics will our relief come to
us, nor yet out of the wrangling of
partisan politicians.
Largely we will get it out of the
economic structure wherein lies the
trouble. The masses of the people
will speak and exert influence to the
extent of their ability to speak as or
ganized units. The thing, then, is to
organize. That, in very truth, is the
supreme thing!