Further, the fundamental doctrine of wages in economics is that the rates of wages depend principally on the efficiency of labor and |THE ECONOMIC DOCTRINE OF THE RATE OF WAGES.| on supply and demand of labor. That is, if the efficiency of the laborers is high, the wages can be high, and if the demand is great and the number of the laborers small, the wages are again high; but if the demand for laborers is small, and the supply is large, the wages must naturally be low, whether the efficiency of the laborers is high or low.

The wages in the United States since 1873, on the whole, have gradually fallen, but not so low as they ought to have done. For, as |WAGES WOULD BE TWICE AS LOW.| the propertyless people have increased in numbers up to tens of millions, the wages should have fallen twice as low, otherwise only half the employees at a time should have employment, because of the over-supply of laborers. But, since the trade-unions have been organized, the wages have artificially been kept up (for the employed) by these organizations, and by the employers themselves to some extent.

“A trade union,” says Mr. Webb, “is a continuous association of wage-earners for the purpose of maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment.[[118]] The chief object of it is to elevate the social position |WAGES ARTIFICIALLY KEPT UP.| of its members. * * * It is a union of individual forces in order to compete against the undue and unfair encroachments of capital into the continuance of the established well-being of the united individuals.”[[119]] Hence, “the trade unions wish to keep up the rates of wages, and to prevent a laborer from accepting employment, under stress of starvation, on terms which in its common judgment would be injurious to the union’s interests. And they would rather encourage idleness than cheap labor. Such idea existed with them since the beginning, or when it originated. This idea originated in 1741,” says Mr. Webb,[[119]] “but the special enforcing of it commenced at the beginning of the eighteenth century.” * * * And surely many an employer knows very well what the “Strike in Detail” of the trade unions under this enforcing means.

The trade unions have used all the means in their power for the purpose of holding up the wages. But, if the wages have fallen notwithstanding the artificial support, their falling testifies to the presence of a mightier force pressing them down.

In 1896 it was said that, “according to the last volume of the Connecticut Labor Report and the Massachusetts Statistics of Manufactures, the nominal rate of wages in |GROSS INCOMES OF WORKERS DECREASED.| 1894 had declined 7 per cent below the level of 1892, while the yearly incomes of laborers had been still farther reduced by the lack of employment.” The Connecticut Report testifies that wages for the same period fell about 10 per cent, and it says that “the heavy losses of the wage-earners, however, came not from reduced pay, but from reduced employment, and that the reduction in pay and in the employment had decreased the total wage-payments 25 per cent.” And “the great mass of families in Connecticut had had their incomes reduced one-fourth,” says Dr. Spahr.[[120]] So that, in Connecticut and Massachusetts, together, “the family incomes of the laborers between 1892 and 1894 fell at least 20 per cent. In Pennsylvania they fell 24 per cent. The fall of wages in agriculture from 1890 to 1894 reduced the incomes of laborers to the extent of 20 per cent.”[[121]] And the rents of houses, on the whole, have risen against the homeless.

It is not necessary to multiply the same examples in the remaining States, since we know that the supply of labor has increased throughout in the United States; and since we know that the demand for labor has proportionately decreased. And, consequently, the wages in general must have fallen according to the fundamental principles of economics, because of the increase of population without property and without resources.

Now then, if the incomes of, say, 40-millions of individuals in the gainful pursuits, have on the whole been reduced; and all these |WHO PROFITS BY THE INCREASE OF WEALTH?| millions of people have been made worse off, we have the right to ask: Who was profited by the phenomenal increase of wealth during the period of the seven years? In other words: Who had obtained the amount of $21,787,908,803 worth, the increase of wealth up to 1897? Is it the group of tenants, or the group of mortgagors? or is it the group of owners of free farms and homes worth $5,000 and under, as they are represented in the 2d R. table, p. [47]? And was it possible for all these highly productive families to retain a goodly share of this phenomenal increase of the wealth?

The above total of the increased wealth, divided by the 7 years, gives, on the average, an increase of $3,112,558,400 every year. It being, of course, understood that this average was smaller in the year 1891, and augmenting year by year, it became largest in the year 1897. And this augmenting necessitates a progressive increase in the business of all monopolies, trusts and combinations, highly increasing the gross and the net incomes of all.

THE TOTAL ITEMS OF THE CONCENTRATION
OF WEALTH.

Let us then sum up the net earnings of the natural monopolies alone, as they are given on p. [101], leaving out their necessary increase |PROFITS OF NATURAL MONOPOLIES.| consequent upon the unavoidable growth of business in their favor during the seven years. The net earnings of $563,689,333 by these monopolies in every year amount to $3,945,825,331 worth of wealth in seven years. This is one item of positive loss by tens of millions of the people in favor of a few families, connected with the monopolies.