LABOUR AND CAPITAL

Thames Star, Volume LII, Issue 13932, 10 July 1919, Page 4

LABOUR AND CAPITAL

A CONVIVIAL EVENING. Directors of the Sitandard; Oil Company of New Jersey and the repreeenita'tives of its em- j ployees under the comp'aniy's indns- ; trial relationship plan met recently for the second anaiual dinner and conference:. A.. C. Bedifbrd, cnadr- < man,; of the Board of Directors, pre- ' sided, and Walter C. Teagle, pre,si- i denit of the company, talked out the 1 outloodt for the system, started a • year ago, by which the employees . bave a voice in fixing: hours, wages, ' and matters of general welfaa^e. .■ ), Mr. Bedford ©poke of the hearty accepta,noe of the plan by the em-, ployees, and said it gave wrokers ;., real voice ia the settlement of qu&s-. tions a£fectinig their welfare. It wa e pointed out by Mr. Teagle j that where a year &go elected repre-!. sentataves of 7866 employees; met at a conference, represenitaftives of 10,246 employees were present that night. He thought it was a record in industrial history that, the wage adjustmenrts made during 1 the yea.r ; had all 'been settled in joint confer-' ences. The importance of the de-; cisions reached, he said, was, md;- . cated by the fact that - within tno year approximately > 5,000,000' dollars had been added to the animal; pay roll: j "Them we come to the- ■ partnership of the community as an owuei I of resources, which is a phase of the situation which until recently has receijved little attention.,",-said Mr. 'Teagle. "The commiunity possesses jointly immense natural 1 wealth; it may be mines, forests/ fisheries, or" other natural resources, which through a combinations of la-~ bour and capital result in the wealth of the community. I "This right of the wmmunity as a. whole has "beeni entirely lost sight of, by the Bolsheviks, whoi mfuse to rega,rd as essential any orgaini&ar tdon, brains, managemeut, or skill, ! and have thereby produced *he con-; ditions of famine which exist in Russia to-day; they have forgotten thait the piroductioin: of wealth does' not depend on labour 'alone, howeTer skilled, ibub to 1 a. greati extent on. "speoially trained 'brains and management). '.'ln the experience of the past year the industrial worker in this company has shown himself to b© as sane and reasonable a« the management has tried to be provident and considerate. 'Out of such co-opera-tion, and wiith.* a proper mndensitanding.v of ■ the relation of the community and of - capital to the labour of ihandi and brain, there is no : problem of induetry wfeich maiy not, ibe^succeslMly solved."