It is a matter of common knowledge and of frequent comment that a given sum of money will now buy very much less in labor or commodities than it would in 1897. The change has been gradual but substantially continuous and the aggregate result has been enormous. The consequence of this change has worked great hardship to those whose incomes have not been adjusted to the changed purchasing power of money but fortunately the rates of wages of nearly all workmen and the prices of practically all products of labor expended upon farms or in factories or otherwise have been raised sufficiently to more or less completely offset it. The principal sufferers are those salaried employees whose salaries have not been readjusted and those whose incomes are received under contracts covering long periods of time or are derived from the marketing of commodities or services at prices more or less effectively controlled by custom or statute. Many of the owners of railway bonds are in the second class and all interstate railways are, as to the disposal of their services, in the third class.
As already noted, the gross revenue derivable by the railways from the transportation of a carload consisting of fifteen tons of fourth class freight between Chicago and New York is the same now that it was in 1897—i. e., $105.00. But $105.00 is worth much less to any railway now than it was in 1897 for money is worth at any time what it will buy at that time. The reports of the Interstate Commerce Commission show the following increases in rates of average daily wages paid to railway employees:
| Wages per day. | |||
| Class of Employees. | |||
| 1897. | 1907. | Increase, per cent. | |
| Station agents | $1.73 | $2.05 | 18.50 |
| Other stationmen | 1.62 | 1.78 | 9.88 |
| Enginemen | 3.65 | 4.30 | 17.81 |
| Firemen | 2.05 | 2.54 | 23.90 |
| Conductors | 3.07 | 3.69 | 20.20 |
| Other trainmen | 1.90 | 2.54 | 33.68 |
| Machinists | 2.23 | 2.87 | 28.70 |
| Carpenters | 2.01 | 2.40 | 19.40 |
| Other shopmen | 1.71 | 2.06 | 20.47 |
| Section foreman | 1.70 | 1.90 | 11.76 |
| Other trackmen | 1.16 | 1.46 | 25.86 |
| Switchmen, flagmen and watchmen | 1.72 | 1.87 | 8.72 |
| Telegraph operators and despatchers | 1.90 | 2.26 | 18.95 |
| Employees, account floating equipment | 1.86 | 2.27 | 22.04 |
| All other employees and laborers | 1.64 | 1.92 | 17.07 |
The foregoing affords a means of ascertaining the real value of $105.00 of railway gross receipts in 1897 and 1907 and the decrease from the earlier to the later year. The following table shows the number of days labor of each of the different classes of railway labor which $105.00 would buy in each of the years indicated:
| Number of days labor | |||
| purchasable for $105.00. | |||
| Class of Employees. | |||
| 1897. | 1907. | Decrease, per cent. | |
| Station agents | 60.7 | 51.2 | 15.65 |
| Other station men | 64.8 | 59.0 | 8.95 |
| Enginemen | 28.8 | 24.4 | 15.28 |
| Firemen | 51.2 | 41.3 | 19.34 |
| Conductors | 34.2 | 28.5 | 16.67 |
| Other trainmen | 55.3 | 41.3 | 25.32 |
| Machinists | 47.1 | 36.6 | 22.29 |
| Carpenters | 52.2 | 43.8 | 16.09 |
| Other shopmen | 61.4 | 51.0 | 16.94 |
| Section | 61.8 | 55.3 | 10.52 |
| Other trackmen | 90.5 | 71.9 | 20.55 |
| Switchmen, flagmen and watchmen | 61.0 | 56.1 | 8.03 |
| Telegraph operators and despatchers | 55.3 | 46.5 | 15.91 |
| Employees, account floating equipment | 56.5 | 46.3 | 18.05 |
| All other employees and laborers | 64.0 | 54.7 | 14.53 |
| —— | —— | —— | |
| Average | 16.27 | ||
The foregoing shows that on the average the gross railway receipts derived from the service assumed as the basis of the calculation would purchase 16.27 per cent. less of the necessary services of railway employees, in 1907 than in 1897 and what is true of the receipts from this service is true of every dollar received by a railway—that is, no railway dollar will pay for more than eighty-four per cent., on the average, as much railway labor as it would in 1897.
The change in railway rates necessary fully to offset this decrease in the value of the money in which rates are paid would amount to an apparent advance of 19.43 per cent, of the money rates now in force.
COST OF FUEL FOR LOCOMOTIVES.
Next to labor the principal single item of expense incurred in the operation of the railways of the United States is for the fuel used in their locomotives. The expenditures for this purpose now constitute about eleven per cent. of the cost of operation and since 1897 have been as follows: