What has been said regarding industrial conditions is not mere theorizing. Private, state and federal investigations into actual conditions confirm the contention that there is a large margin of unemployed, and that a considerable portion of those who do find employment are overworked and underpaid regardless of life and limb. Anyone who studies the various official reports on this subject, must conclude that Dr. Devine's summary of the Pittsburgh Survey was well within the truth and is applicable to practically the whole country:
"Low wages for the great majority of the laborers employed by the mills, not lower than in other large cities, but low compared with the prices—so low as to be inadequate to the maintenance of a normal American standard of living; wages adjusted to the single man in the lodging house, not the responsible head of a family.
"Still lower wages for women, who receive, for example, in one of the metal trades, in which the proportion of women is great enough to be menacing, one-half as much as unorganized men in the same shops and one-third as much as men in the union.
"The destruction of family life; not in any imaginary or mystical sense, but by the demands of the day's work, and by the very demonstrable and material method of typhoid fever and industrial accidents; both preventable, but both costing in single years in Pittsburgh considerably more than a thousand lives, and irretrievably shattering nearly as many homes."[49]
Assuming, throughout this discussion, that $6.00 a week ($1.00 a week less than Miss Butler's estimate), or $312.00 a year is the lowest fair individual wage; and $11.00 a week, or $572.00 a year is the lowest fair family living wage:[50] it is easy to show from reliable reports that scores of thousands of individuals and heads of families fall below this standard. But in considering any figures quoted here, or to be found elsewhere, it should always be remembered that the actual wage may be much below the rate of wage. One employed at the rate of $6.00 a week may not make anything like that because of loss of time.
How much is lost through unemployment, it is hard to say. The United States Industrial Commission was of the opinion, that "it is impossible to collect statistics of any value whatever relative to the unemployment of unorganized labor, among whom lack of employment is a much more serious thing than it is with skilled or organized labor."[51] It would seem, however, that in the clothing trades, the employees lose at least one day in every six.[52] According to a Federal report issued in 1911, in Baltimore one-fifth of the force worked between five days and full time; one-tenth between four and five days; one-seventh between two and three, and five per cent, two days or less.[53] A report of the New York State Bureau of Labor for 1906[54] contains the following suggestive table regarding the unemployment of certain classes of organized labor. It may rightly be assumed that among unorganized workmen conditions are worse.
TABLE I.
NO. AND PROPORTION OF UNEMPLOYED WAGE-EARNERS
| Mon. | No. of unions report'g | No. of memb'rs report'g | No. idle at end of month | Per cent idle | Per cent idle | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1905 | 1904 | 1903 | 1902 | 1902-5 | ||||||
| Mean for year | 9.3 | 11.2 | 16.9 | 17.5 | 14.8 | 15.1 | ||||
| Jan. | 191 | 84,539 | 12,682 | 15. | 22.5 | 25.8 | 20.5 | 20.9 | 22.4 | |
| Feb. | 190 | 85,155 | 13,031 | 15.3 | 19.4 | 21.6 | 17.8 | 18.7 | 19.4 | |
| Mch. | 192 | 25,956 | 2,952 | 11.6 | 19.2 | 27.1 | 17.6 | 17.3 | 20.3 | |
| Apr. | 192 | 90,352 | 6,583 | 7.3 | 11.8 | 17.0 | 17.3 | 15.3 | 15.4 | |
| May | 192 | 91,163 | 6,364 | 7.0 | 8.3 | 15.9 | 20.2 | 14.0 | 14.6 | |
| June | 192 | 92,100 | 5,801 | 6.3 | 9.1 | 13.7 | 23.1 | 14.5 | 15.1 | |
| July | 195 | 94,571 | 7,229 | 7.6 | 8.0 | 14.8 | 17.8 | 15.6 | 14.1 | |
| Aug. | 195 | 94,220 | 5,462 | 5.8 | 7.2 | 13.7 | 15.4 | 7.1 | 10.9 | |
| Sept. | 195 | 94,290 | 5,252 | 6.3 | 5.9 | 12.0 | 9.4 | 6.3 | 8.4 | |
| Oct. | 195 | 92,052 | 6,383 | 6.9 | 5.6 | 10.8 | 11.7 | 4.2 | 9.8 | |
| Nov. | 195 | 93,042 | 7,052 | 7.6 | 6.1 | 11.1 | 16.4 | 14.3 | 12.0 | |
| Dec. | 195 | 93,318 | 14,352 | 15.4 | 11.1 | 19.6 | 23.1 | 22.2 | 19.0 | |
Other deductions that must be made from the apparent wage are the withholding of pay for long periods, exorbitant prices and rents obtained through company stores and houses, fines, and increases in the cost of living.
Therefore, it is not unreasonable to conclude that the per diem or weekly wage rate as given by the Bureau of Labor and other reports, affords, by itself, an accurate statement only of the maximum yearly wage. This should always be remembered in judging any facts hereafter adduced.
In the fifteenth volume of the bulletins of the Bureau of Labor will be found many interesting tables bearing on this question of wages. But as it is impracticable to quote them at any length here, a few of the more salient facts must suffice. Laborers in the flour mills of the South were working twelve hours a day for 11c. an hour.[55] Women in the carpet factories of the North were getting no more.[56] In the factory product of the clothing trade great numbers received less than 10c., 11c., and 12c. an hour (p. 35), and the compensation in sweatshops was much less. Male boarders in the knit-goods factories of the North-Central section were averaging less than $387.00 per annum. Women in the same factories were getting much less, some even as low as 7c. and 8c. an hour (p. 43). Silk-spinners in the North-Atlantic section were making only $5.00 a week, or less than $260.00 a year, for a nine and one-half hour day (p. 58). Male cigar-stemmers in the same section were making $6.00 a week (p. 59). In Michigan, in 1905, there were 3414 boys between fourteen and sixteen earning on an average 77c. a day, and 1725 girls making 64c. a day. In 1904, the average yearly earnings in the food preparations industry was $441.00; in salt production, $451.00; on tobacco and cigars, $393.00 (p. 334).
In New Jersey, in 1904-5, the average earnings in the cigar industry were $316.70; silk-weaving, $480.11; woolen and worsted goods, $373.43. In the same State in 1903-4, there were 1985 adult males receiving less than $3.00 a week; 3234 between $3.00 and $4.00; 5595 between $4.00 and $5.00; 6037 between $5.00 and $6.00; 12,406 between $7.00 and $8.00; 14,300 between $8.00 and $9.00, though $9.00, working full time every week, would be only $468.00 a year.