The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-03-29
By JOHN L. SPIVAK

TULSA, Okla. - In most
cases these company towns
center around the oil area.
Living conditions in the
homes naturally depend upon
individuals. Bunk houses are usu-
ally in charge Of a "crum- boss -"
who tends to the cleaning and
sweeping. Occasionally a company
sets up a commisssry or a restau-
rant for the single men but it is
more common for them to board
out with private families. Santa
ton, as a whole, is good and school
facilities as tolerable as can be ex-
pected when the oil town is quite
distance away and not large
enough to support its own school
for the children.
There is an imprtant difference
between the company house in a
textile area or a mining town and
an oil company house. In the former
the companies charge for rent, light.
gas and whatever else the traffic
VIII bear. In the oil area most com
panies do not charge for rent. light
ing, water, etc. and with the wage
schedule what it is today, this is Of
some help to the workers.
During the past few years, in
Guiding the last one when the oil
INDUSTRY operated under a code.
general living conditions of the
workers are far below what they
we're in 1929, both as to the earning
ana purchasing power of the dol
lar, 1 mention 1929 because the
code provides that the wage scale
for almost all operations shall be
as Of July, 1929. This is not en-
forced; instead, wages average less
than half Of what they were. while
living costs have scarcely changed
here from the 1929 level, especially
since the MIRA. boosted retail
prices around here.
The oil code specifically names
only three wage scales out of some
500 different operations in the in
dustry: stillmen, rotary drillers and
the minimum wage For "all others"
II provides q wage scale as of July.
1879. Instead Of paying this wage
scale, the companies, large and
small, pay the minimum wage scale
on almost all operations.
The oil worker usually gets Maid
semi-monthly or monthly. In the
reflneries the minimum wage is az
cents an hour and that is what is
usually paid. Field work, due to
its very nature, frequently necessi-
tates men going far from their
homes, often as many as 100 miles
one way and another 100 back. The
time thus lost is the workers. After
getting on the job they have to
work eight hours, and that at
usually the minimum wage scale. I
met one oil worker who rises at
in the morning and does not get
home until Z or in the evening.
BY that time he is so exhausted
that he has Just about enough en-
ergy to eat and throw himself in
bed to rest for the next days
grind.
The major oil companies, with
the exception Of ignoring provisions
IN the code regarding wage scales.
simply confine themselves to pay
ing the minimum scale. In some
instances, even with the major COM
panles, some operations which we're
bringing the workers more than the
minimum wage even before the
code, had the wages reduced to the
minimum.
This paying of the minimum
wage plus a recently instituted rule
oy most companies that all en-
ployees buy a gas book-eyen if
they do not own or drive a car
is causing great deal of unrest
among the workers, 1 have heard
worker after worker speak with
slight indignation at wage cuts.
minimum wage scales, efforts to
foist company union on them
and get furiously indignant over
being forced TO buy a gas book.
This petty act by the companies
seems to be playing the part of
the straw that weighed too heavily
on the camels back.
THIS restlessness-and it is wide
L spreads being held in check
mostly by Wildcat william and his
appeals to patriotism" and most
oil workers, strangely enough. are
fearful of being called "unpatriotic."
] haven't heard so much talk about
patriotism in years. The A. F. of
L. organizer instead of permitting
wages to become an issue defects
1t into a patriotic" channel. Those
workers who rise at unemployed
meetings or protest too vehemently
against oil company abuses and in
sist that their local and interna-