The Hokitika Guardian WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 3rd, 1923. LABOUR And PRODUCTION.

Hokitika Guardian, 3 January 1923, Page 2

The Hokitika Guardian WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 3rd, 1923. LABOUR And PRODUCTION.

The relation of production to working hours is naturally a governing factor in the eost of living and the economic position of a country. The question is reviewed by a financial > iildication of New York which analyses tile position in relation to the eight hour day system in Germany. The paper proceeds: The eight-lion i day prevails throughout Germany, having been inaugurated by decrees issued early iti the revolution. A hill, fathered hy tho Wirth Cabinet, to formally legalise the system has been ponding for sbme time without being acted upon. A studv of the results of the reduction upon industry, made by Dr. O. Holfinann, director of the Chamber of Commerce of Minden. Westphalia, has appeared in a hook entitled, '“Working Hours and Production in Germany after the War.” It is written apparently without bias, and admits evidence that in certain branches or in certain production conditions the eight hours system lias done no liaiui. Rut. on the whole, the judgment is extremely unfavourable. Some of ilie sharpest criticism of eight hours. Dr Hoffmann points out. comes from labor leaders and even from Socialists. An old enthusiast for eight hours and a strong Socialist. ex-Ministor Dr Mueller, lately wrote that “compensation for the shortened time by more intense production has not taken place.” The editor of “Die TConjimktur,” Richard Calwer. who is iiot only a Socialist but also a statistician and economist of 10cogniscd rank, has condemned eight hours as “economically fatal,” saving that the reform has caused a great injury to production." In general. German working hours to-dav are less b.v one-fifth i han he fore the war. Production has fallen much more than onefifth. Rut |)r 11 off mmn says quito fairly that there is no exact proof that production everywhere would have fallow more than one-fifth if there had been no other unfavourable factors. Reduced produetion may partly he explained hv inferior health and feeding, by disappearance in war of many first class workers, hv deterioration of ma--chines and by political ferment. In many trades, however, the per capita decline in output is greater than can fairly he explained by these unfavourable conditions. Coal mining in Germany is now a level seven-hour day. Before the war the rule was eight hours. As against a reduction of oueoightli in working time there lias been a decline of about one-third in output from 0.88-1 ton per man per shift \ to 0.597 ton. This is In the Ruhr (mining district of Dortmund), hut . figures from other mines are much the same. Dr Hoffmann holds that in works and branches where payment by hour prevails a one-fifth output reduction ns due exclusively to the shortened hours , may be taken as proved. In such | works the intensity of work has not | increased at all. Where piece payment j prevails conditions are otherwise. The i working liuui,s in concerns or branches • practicing piece payment have been re- [ ducod also to eight, and here if the workman is to earn his former income he must either gel a higher piece-wage or he must work- more intensely. T)r Hoffmann holds that more intense work has been achieved in certain industries where tho human element domi- | nates; but that where the intensity of t work depends primarily upon the speed of machines, the shorter hours of piece- j payment workers have brought «hortened produetion. He calculates for all the workers an average reduction of : fifteen per cent- in production, and cm]- | dilating the loss in money, estimates j it at 3.(500,000.000 gold marks anno- : ally. These figures have a curious oo- J incidence for they are exactly the fig- j tiros for the annual payments fixed b.v j the London ultimatum of May, 1921. j Rut there still remains the question, whether the German Government, even if so disposed could compel all the wage earners to go back to the ten hour day and cheerfully turn out tho twen- j ty five per cent increase of product, for ' the purpose of having ft all turned over j as reparations payments.