LESS WORK, MORE PAY

Hokitika Guardian, 17 January 1922, Page 3

LESS WORK, MORE PAY

LABOUR FALLACY. (Sydney Herald.) The moulders are advised by their secretary to take steps to shorten the hours of labour. In this way lie writes there would be given additional employment to thousands of men and women in Australia. Further, it would mean higher wages, for the fewer men there are competing for jobs the higher the wages they are able to demand. Such an appeal is alluring to many men and to many women. It is akin to the desire of many to get something for nothing, to obtain a reward for which they have given no equivalent payment, j The moulders have dangled before them I by one whom they apparently trust to ! he both their servant and their adviser j the hope of obtaining a better reward by not working so long for that reward. If they follow his advise they’ are no more to he blamed than those who, beguiled by a company prospectus, or hv tire advice of a friend “ in the know,” rush a proposition promising 59 per cent, return. The desire at the bottom is tlie same in each ease, a desire which is rooted in human nature, unavowed as it always is, disguised as it often is, the

desire that somebody else shall do the hard work and that the individual having tlie desire shall reap the benefit. Nature implants the desire and thou determines that if it is satisfied the race of the individual who satisfies it shall die out. It is tlie race of hard workers which, survives. If the hours of labour were halved it would follow from the reasoning of the secretary of the moulders that wages would he doubled, since if there is the same amount of work to ho done and the same mini her of men to do it, tlie com-

petition for the men will he doubled. A further halving of the hours should

cause a further doubling of wages. Tlie argument apparently prc-supposcs that as the cost of production rose tlie manufacturers would he able to obtain increased prices. But what would happen if other employees followed the example of the iroinnoiilders, as no doubt tlie ironmoulders would welcome them in

doing. Everybody would he getting four times the wages which they are receiving at present. )Y hat of the cost of living, though ? As the hours of

labour would he only one-fourtli of

| those at present worked, production ! would amount only to one-fourth of j that at present, if all the present em- ! ployecs continued to be employed. I What, then, would the price he? Would there he sufficient goods produced to go round? If not who would get the production ? There would he just the same number of people competing for one fourth of tlie production. Then the hoot would he oil the other loot. The employees, in the guise of consumers, would he running after the employers asking for their produce. No doubt, the feeling for working iow- : er hours would extend t<; the wheat growers. They are a hard-working section of the community. In seeding | time they work not less than eight hours a day. If a man with a sevenfurrow plough can plough in eight hours seven acres a day, lie may ueteiininc io work only four hours, lie would get only half his former acreage under crop, and so would argue, according to tlie secretary of the moulders, “ As I am only getting half my acteage under crop, the harvest will Iso only half of what it would be with a full acreage. Hence there will he much more compo-. titum for my wheat, an til shall get a ! much hotter price lor it. 1 shall have a, much better time, and 1 shall get just ( as much money as ii I had a lull crop, j He knows too much about the market to argue that by reducing -his crop he, will increase his aggregate receipts. It J may happen, he thinks, hut lie will not | count upon it, since there arc other ; wheat growers in the world besides him-, self. He would clamour for more pro-j tection so as to prevent the wheat oi America coming Lore, and the ten-hour I wheat man on the other side oi the , world taking the bread out of the • mouth of the four-hour wheat man in I Australia. Of course, the consumers of l bread would lie forced to instruct their! representatives to listen to the demands j of the wheat grower. It could not he that the three or four secondary indus- > try man would want to get cheap broad at the expense ot the tour-hour primary industry man. So up would go tire price of bread, and the wheat man would think that lie could reduce his 1 hours still further, with a consequential fall in his yield and a slil higher price for the wheat lie grows for its conversion into bread. He might find the life so comforting that lie would soon work only one hour a day, and so reduce the production of wheat, that having thus the staff of life in his hands lie would, through his own union, keep the con- J trol of the foodstuffs, and nsk of the ( other workers whatever price he deemed fit. Of what use then would lie the eleven-hour week and the quadruple wages of the secondary industry man. I The truth is that what matters is not the amount bf wages received, but the quantity of goods for which the wa«es received can be exchanged. Lie quantity of goods for which wages can ; be exchanged depends wholly upon j the quantity of goods produced-by the , employers and employees working to- ( getlier. If through any action of either, that quantity of production is reduced, . then the effective purchasing power of the wages is reduced. To bring more men in and keep production at the same level by means of a reduction of hours, if such a practice were possible would not give to the employees more goods for the wages they receive. It would simply result in the majority of the employees having fewer goods for their consumption so that the former unemployed could have more than they had while unemployed. Such a practice may he a palliative of unemployment. It is not a remedy. Lie only remedy is to bring about conditions which" will cause a consumption of the goods which the present unemployed when put to work will produce in addition to the goods produced by those now in work. Wages followed the upward cost of living. Some, a great deal, of the present 0 unemployment has been caused through wages not following the down- , ward cost of living. All the necessary articles of food are lower now than : they were 12 months ago. Clothing too, is cheaper. House rents are no lower. Land transportation in Australia is considerably lower. We depend on export for our continued existence in comfort. We can live in a fashion

without export. If wages keep up, then our exports will decrease further than what they have done. It is only the wool and the wheat which are maintaining us. Meat is in a precarious state, and the hutter outlook is not promising. Metals for the time being have disappeared from our export list. The workers of Australia, to-day are living on the wool men and the wheat men. Wo aro depending wholly on seasonal conditions. A bad season would spell disaster to us. Our metals would, if exported, help us immensely; in a bad season, they would save us. They cannot bo mined to-day because the rate of wages prevents competition in the world markets. The fight is made against a reduction in wages in the mining industry because the leaders recognise that such a reduction must ho followed by reduction in wages in other industries. Yet if we are to reduce unemployment there must be reductions in wages commensurate with reductions in other costs of production, and with prices generally. While wages remain as they are the cost of production is such that the demand is limited. Were there a further fall in the cost of production the area of the demand would be widened and further production would be stimulated. nar trapruw n»grjKiiam»