10. Arbitration by a court which is compelled to act, and can enforce its decision, may deviate in a particular case from the rate of pay which strikes would yield; but if the deviation is frequent and great, it will induce a rebellion against the system of compulsory arbitration. The rate under this system cannot differ greatly from the result secured with no arbitration at all. The chief value of all the foregoing modes of settling disputes lies in their prevention of costly interruptions of business. They may reduce the number of strikes and prevent much waste and suffering.
11. A mode of procedure which aims chiefly to end strikes usually depends on making compromises between opposing claims. This secures an approach to a reasonable adjustment, as between employers and employed, but does not affect the differences between the wages of different classes of laborers.
12. In order that any mode of adjusting wages may give fair comparative rates, monopolies must be repressed; and this can only be accomplished by measures which are independent of tribunals of arbitration.
FOOTNOTES
[1] If the employer were a corporation possessing a monopoly of its department of production, it would be difficult quickly to open such new sources of supply as would be requisite; but a temporary reduction of import duties would often go far in this direction. And a measure which would insure the running of the plant under a temporary receivership would, of course, do it.
CHAPTER XXVII
BOYCOTTS AND THE LIMITING OF PRODUCTS
When free from the taint of monopoly, trade unions, as has been shown, help rather than hinder the natural forces of distribution. Collective bargaining is normal, but barring men from a field of employment is not so. Connected with this undemocratic policy are certain practices which aim to benefit some laborers at the cost of others, and thus tend to pervert the distributive process.