Rangitikei Advocate. TUESDAY, MARCH 5, 1907. SECOND EDITION. EDITORIAL NOTES

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXI, Issue 8756, 5 March 1907, Page 2

Rangitikei Advocate. TUESDAY, MARCH 5, 1907. SECOND EDITION. EDITORIAL NOTES

THE strike at the freezing works has drawn public attention to the wages question hud many enquirers have boon seeking for some definite standard by which the level of wages may be fixed. Evidently the Arbitration Act contains no solution of the problem and the practice of the Arbitration Court gives us no further light as its decisions seem to be arrived at either by haphazard or by rule of thumb. Among the numerous authorities who give their opinions on the subject wo find many who speak loudly and confidently hut none who succeed in carrying conviction to onr minds. We arc ‘'fold on the one hand that the needs of the workmen oiler the only fair test, and Onto ; the needs of the married man v, it a a family are greater than those of the single man the former should receive higher pay than the latter. To the obvious objection that no married man would then bo employed the answer is made that the proportion of apprentices to journeymen is already regulated by law and that it would not he impossible to make a similar condition as to the proper ratio between married men and bachelors in any given trade. Wo need not discuss the many practical difficulties which at once suggest themselves in this scheme, as the labour loaders will have uoue of it and prefer a totally different method of fixing the standard wage. The President and Secretary of the Wellington Trades and Labour Council express flic opinion that there will be no industrial peace until the basis of wages is ou a percentage of profits. They consider that at the present time, when many industries arc very prosperous, the working man is not getting his fair share of the good things, and the panacea they propose is profit sharing. It would bo in foresting to know whether these labour leaders are aware that this system of determining wages has boon tried over and over again, and that it has, with hardly a single exception, turned out a failure. So long as profits have been high the system has been successful enough, but as soon as bad years come the men have become dissatisfied with the results aud have reverted to tiro old methods of bargaining. Messrs Lover of Port Sunlight, aud Cadbury of Bouruville, Who are employers desirous of doing the best they can for their men, have, after full consideration, put aside the idea of profit sharing and adopted a different and more successful plan. Instead of giving each of their employees a bonus annually out of profits, which may bo wasted or mispeut, they pay a fair rate of wages and every year put aside a certain amount of their profits, for the benefit of their workmen. From funds thus accumulated these firms have built good houses for their employees, and provided cricket and football grounds aud other means of physical, and intellectual recreation for workmen and their families. Pensions are also provided for old employees. The results have been most satisfactory to both employers and workers, and tlio experiment lias been, carried on long enough to prove that it is a far more hopeful solution than that of profit sharing. Unfortunately the scheme cannot ho universally adopted, as the profits of many firms are not large: enough to j permit lot philantliropy. It is “irnjpOßßible in the limited space at our

disposal'to deal as fully &9 W 0 Could wish with the subject, but it is instructive to note that the men who pose as leaders of the Labour party in Now Zealand can only put forward theories which have been tried and proved impracticable in the past.

HITHERTO Mr H. G. Wells has had almost a monopoly of the right to make fanciful forecasts of the future, but a new competitor has appeared in the shape, of a well-kuown German professor who discourses at length on the result of the general adoption of air ships. Our general idea of German professors is that they are more remarkable for the ponderosity of their learning than for their lightness of touch and the writer wo refer to seems no exception to the rule. He maintains that when ships sail in the air as easily as trains now move on the land Britain’s insular position will no longer prove a protection and the Himalayas will be as useless as

a natural rampart for India. The British navy will be reduced to comparative insignificance and the contest for the supremacy of the world will ho fought .over again. Great Britain and America may, says bur professor, build-aerial fleets equal in number to those of Germany but neither country possesses the great army which will he necessary for following up the victories gained by flying warships. It is therefore concluded that Germany will succssesfully dominate the whole world. Wo can hardly imagine that a German professor would perpetrate a joke so wo must believe that his work is serious and rejoice that the destruction “of the British empire lias been delayed for the present as we feared that the German fleet was going to wipe out the ' British navy within the next few years.