The Dominion TUESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1910. THE WORKERS' DISCONTENT.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 998, 13 December 1910, Page 4

The Dominion TUESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1910. THE WORKERS' DISCONTENT.

: The prevalence of labour disputes and serious strikes, not only in Great Britain, but in, Europe" and America also, has caused a great deal of thought to be devoted in England to the cause of labour discontent and the way out. The way out has not been, found, but th° causes have been sifted thoroughly enough to enable those "solutions" of the trouble which are Unsound to be marked down.. The phase of the discussion to which we refer began with an article in wJiich a Tyncside correspondent of the Westminster Gazette, writing during the currency of the boilcrmakers' strike, sought to discover "what is wrong with the workers." The better-class workman, ho said, is filled with a deep discontent with his conditions. "The schools have .given him education; ho has travelled move; he reads, if it be no more than his daily paper. He is uneasy at the dirt and squalor amid which ho finds himself, and yet he scarce knows what is wrong with Mm. Deep down in his soul is blind revolt against life as ho finds it, • ■ . At the baco of all this ferment ■ is the fact that education has raised the whole standard of thought and of conduct of the workman, and lias given him imagination and ideals. Tho Tynesido worker looks at a great building yard, remembers 15 when it was small, and says, i radically all that has been built out of profits—tho profits of our work, and my wages arc a shilling a week less, than when I camo to the J-yne. His resentment is terrible, and tfie failure of the strike weapon has intensified his feeling that capital" is .a fiendish enemy of labour. .Although tho economics that give this edge to tho workers' discontent are rooted in fallacy and error—Dn. Findlay showed some time ago that oven in Now Zealand a very small all-round increase in wages would destroy all profits, and so destroy all industry—yet nobody can deny that in most countries there is much misery amongst the workers, and misery. that it is the duty of 'statesmanship to remove. Tho difficulty begins when the way out is looked for. One strictly Philosophical view is that which may be put this way: Work is of two sorts, the pleasurable and zestful (and this.calls for tho intensesfc effort) and tho dull and mechanical, home work is all drudgery; no work is without its dull chapters. For the general alleviation of misery, therefore, concentration must bo made upon the problem of leisure, ' and the solution is so to introduce such elements into the education of the young that they shall be able to nnd a rational happiness in their leisure.' The commonest inclination however, is to turn to direct legislation as a means of reducing the hardships of tho workers.' The London Nation, for oxample, appears, without directly saying so, to see in the Westminster Gazette article some further evidence in support ot its Jacobin belief in the efficacy ol theories that are translatable into law. It only directly advocates, however the Town Planning principle. The Spectator, on the other land, while welcoming anything that tends to make the working man discontented with squalor in his life can see only evil in encouraging the worker to believe that "capita!" is his enemy. "The real economic nope.of the worker is in a greatly increased accumulation of capital," tor the more capital there is seeking employment, the' better prices tho worker can command. "Capital was never yet accumulated without tne workers being helped and their wages actually or potentially raised. Oapital-was never destroved, whether it be in the form of a loss of credit or through the actual physical destruction of material being injured." Tho path to the accumulation of capital is thrift, and thrift among tho working classes—not that gruesome thrift which can produce a more dreadful moral wretchedness still, but that thrift which means self-denial and a thoughtful avoidance of waste. Something like a middle course between. tho rival views of the Nation imd Spectator was steered by Sib Edwaed Gkey in a notable lecture at Darlington last month. It could not, he said, bo increasing hardship that was causing the discontent, because, although there was plenty of hardship in the world, there was less hardship on the whole than fifty years ago. Moreover, strikes were not the work of men driven to despair by unemployment, but of men in full employment. The underlying cause was that the hopes and expectations of men were greater than they were in previous generations. Tho theory of political, equality had created an expectation of economic equality. Sir Edward Gbey. proceeded to introduce the same, principle as was insisted on by the Spectator. After stressing the need for order and organisation he pointed out that without the prosperity of a. business there could be no progress. What the workers must avoid" was ignoble motives, "attempting to set class igainst class": "The gospel of hate would not build un anything. We wore apt to speak in terms of class, nnd that unconsciously exaggerated the difficulties, but there was that in human life which brought men together." The thing that must strike everybody who reads any collection of sincere and thoughtful contributions to a problem that is distressing to all humane people is the absence of any suggestion of a juick patent solution. It is only 'the

Jacobin and the labour agitator win ia ready with a rapid cure. Wo bj ; no moans believe that a largo sectior '' of humanity must of necessity suffci for ever; but while we should re joice, like everyone else, if happiness for all were only a matter oJ turning legislative screws and taps l_ we cannot avoid the fact, which" is '• as plain as the unnecessary wretched- :. noss of large sections of tho workors, that tho end of labour's discontent cannot come through arbitrary = declarations by any Legislature, Salvation can only come through • the workers themselves, aided by laws which help men to be free and - which encourage men to utilise then : best qualities. There is no good foi . anybody—and, least of all in the s long run, for the workers themselves '. —in that Radical legislation, aimed • at a class, which . expresses "the = gospel of hate!""