Evening star., 1935-01-06

Drawn
PROFOUND fool theories you can talk
glibly about sharing the work." you
can believe in impractical schemes for
absorbing the unemployed; but this
cold fact still stareS you in the face.
1t has been a fact a long time. The
Roman Empire collapsed when mill
tarism absorbed too much industrial
labor The medieval guild system
blew up when the honest burgomaSters
established their own N. r. A. and re-
stricted production and employment.
1t is this simple fact that the de-
tenders of A. A. A. have found so en-
barrassing There may have been
some justification for giving the farm
ers a dole but the proposition that you
can help the country by restricting
production def1es economics. 1t is a
devastating thought that the fearful
costs of relief are partly due to the
artificial reduction of food Stuffs. 1t
is this simple fact about production
that puts to rout the whole crowd Of
amateur economists who have been
misleading government and labor with
talk about over production" and de
fective consumer power" and an EZRA
of plenty" 1t is reflection on jour-
nalism in America that the findings Of
two excellent books recently published
by the Brookings Institution should
have created widespread editorial sur
prise. These two books merely DEM
! onstrated statiStically what economists
| have been teaching for years 1t is
this simple fact of economics that
made technocracy so ridiculous.
Tendency to Starvation.
The fundamental truth that you
cannot help labor by reducing pro-
duction is the basic fact in this 90
hour week matter If the average work
week in normal times is A hours, then
the national dividend is simply the
product of A hours of labor applied
to our land and capital Cut this
work week to % hours and you de-
stroy the American standard of living.
Cut it again to IL hours and our civ
ilization disappears Cut it once more
to 5l2 hours. and death sweeps away
the population. But you say, this is
! proposal to cut to 80 hours Exactly.
1t will have the same starvation tend
ency. but it will not go quite so far.
We could drop the discussion at this
point. But the matter does Justify
some refined analysis. The hours of
labor in mechanical industry so years
/ ago were go hours week. A hundred
| years ago laborers who talked of fu-
ture l0-hour day were regarded as
dangerous radicals. In the earlier
! times men worked from sun-up to
sun-down. One Of the glorious facts
OF American history is the slow but
relentless reduction in the hours OF
labor. There is no economic historian
whose heart has not been stirred in
pity by the annals of the child. woman
| and man workers in the time of Rob-
ert Owen.
What has caused this blessed i'm
provement? 1t was not the kind
heartedness of capitalists. AS a class
capitalists have been quite as blind to
economic truth as labor leaders A
vice president of the United States
Steel Corp. years ago stated that the
AS AAOuA Noy lAACL lIlcll
old at 40. But Judge Gary reported
that the steel industry could not afford
to reduce hours. 1t was not the labor
unions. The hours of labor were 60
ing down steadily for so years before
the American Federation of Labor was
born and they have gone down rapidly
in wholly unorganized lines. 1t was
not legislation. There has never been
in American history any general law
reducing the hours of labor in private
industry and there has been no Gov
eminent pressure until N. r. AS blind
excursion into the field.
Economic Forces Credited.
It was the operation of economic
forces that reduced the hours of labor.
The most striking feature of our mod
ern capital equipment is its all but
unbelievable productivity. The power
loom and steam engine of the New
England of century ago were ludi-
crously inefficient. but they so sur
passed hand work that they built
cities in a generation. This produc-
tivity Of capital has been an accelera-
ting marvel. And with every increase
in output the Nation has had choice
to make. 1t could take this increased
production in a higher standard Of
living, or in increase of population, or
in shorter hours This Nation divided
it among all three. It developed q
standard of living that is the envy of
other peoples. BY an extraordinary
birth rate and a reckless immigration
policy it had population growth un-
known before. And steadily, in all
lines, it reduced the hours of labor.
But this choice among three options
is not accidental nor arbitrary. In the
absence of Government interference
or labor union monopoly, the choice is
itself determined by immutable eco
nomic forces. This involves some
rather tricky economic analysis, and
it may well be that the legislator who
has the power of life and death over
American industry will not care to
weary his mind with such tedious rea-
soning. But here it is, none the less.
The inevitable tendency of capital
iStic production is to substitute ma
chinery for man power. The pick be-
comes the steam shovel, the small
town butcher is replaced by the pack
ing plant, the bookkeeper gives way
to the bookkeeping machine. The
machine tends ever to become more
complicated and to run at higher
! speed. The strain of long sustained
Tabor on delicate and fast-moving ma
chimes runs rapidly into diminishing
returns. Long hours begin to make
for slipshod work. mistakes, accidents,
irregularity of output, rapid turn.
over of labor and a tortured labor
force. ALI these cost money. The
last hour in 10 costs the employer
more than he gets from operation.
The familiar argument of labor that