INCREASED WAGES

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 57, Issue 25, 9 November 1936, Page 5

INCREASED WAGES

AMERICAN STEEL INDUSTRY. BENEFIT TO 600,000 WORKERS. (United Press Association —Copyright.) NEW YORK, Nov. 7. Led. by the American Steel CorrpoWition, American corporations have Increased the purchasing power of 600,000 employees by rises and bonuses. Twenty-four companies simultaneously ordered increased extra dividends, benefiting 300,000 stockholders. The steel workers’ wage increase amounts to 75,000,000 dollars a year, benefiting 500,000 employees. It will be effective on November 16. A sum of 30,000,000 dollars represeifts the share of the United Steel Corporation, the largest steel unit, employing at present 230,000 workers. . ■ The steeol wage plan provides for increases of 12 to 25 per cent, in the lowest category of labour, and increases of 10 per cent, and less higher up. The average is 10 per cent. The plan \ will place hourly earnings 17 per cent, above the 1929 United States steel plan. It provides for fluctuation of wages, with a cost of living plan new to the steel industry and evidently patterned on the General Electric Company’s plan. The steel wage agreements were signed by the management and the men, giving the men the status of collective bargainers. Under the Wagner Act this is significant in. view of the Lewis unionisation drive.