TRADE AND LABOUR NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 251, 22 October 1926, Page 15

TRADE AND LABOUR NOTES.

(By INDUSTRIAL TRAMP.) UNION MEETINGS FOR THE WEEK. . Saturday, October 23 — Freezing Works I Employees. j Monday, October 25—Labour Day CelebraI tlon, Domain Cricket Ground. i Tuesday, October 26—Stonemasons. Wednesday, October 27—Labour Day Committee. Thursday, October 2S—Moulders, Coopers. LABOUR DAY. On Monday next, the Auckland unionists will hold high holiday in the Domain cricket ground, while in the south, the local unions are celebrating Labour's holiday, each in their own way, more or less pretentious, but all with the idea of preserving the one day intimately connected with the New Zealand Labour movement. Auckland usually celebrates this day with functions extending over Saturday, Sunday and Monday, but this year the Trades Hall trustees, who have been the executive conducting these annual celebrations, have decided on a one-day function, as, of late yearsj our climate, which used to be rather genial at this time of the year, has been displaying some uncertainty of the weather, and a three-days function needs a very optimistic spirit indeed. On Monday the function will be observed on the cricket ground only, and a comprehensive programme of sports for old and young has been arranged, and, given fine weather, a successful day should be the result. NO PROCESSION THIS YEAR. It used to be the rule to start Labour Day by a procession from the Queen's wharf through the streets to the Domain, but that was in the days when the average unionist took a pride in his union, and etrove to make it prominent by his presence at the rear of the union banner. Each year this interest waned, until, four years ago, it was decided to drop a function which had degenerated into a mere advertising function to display the products of the worker, and not the worker himself. The last procession in an Auckland Labour Day celebration coat nearly £200 to put on the programme. It drew a crowd on the footpaths all right, but it was a crowd who went home or to i other places of amusement in the afternoon. Until the unions wake up to the fact that their membership of an organisation that carefully watches over their working conditions, is or should be a source of pride instead of a matter to be deprecated, a union procession on Labour Day would be a farce. Early in the next year, the Trades Hall trustees intend to organise the Auckland usions with the object of resuscitating the ■Labour Day procession for the 1927 Labour Day celebration in all its former glory, but this year there will be no display on the Auckland etreeta.

SECRETS OF HIGH WAGES. Official figures show that after making allowances for differences between the purchasing power of the dollar and the shilling, the New York workman receives on an average more than twice ac much real or commodity wages—that is, not merely money wages—as the Londoner. Taking wages and prices in 1913 as each equal to one hundred in both countries, we reach the following results: — TJ.S. Gt. Britafn Wages Prices Wages Prices 1920 199 226 230 253 1921 203 147 260 181 1»22 193 149 200 159 1923 ...... 211 154 ITO 162 1024 228 150 170 174 In Great Britain prices fall and wages fall with them. In the United States prices fall and wages rise at the same time. The "Daily Express" lately printed a [ summary of the conclusions reached by [ two British engineers, Mr. Bertram ! Austin, M.8.E., M.A., and Mr. W. FT I Lloyd, M.A., A.MjI.E.E., who visited the I United States last autumn to study this I great contrast and discover the secrete of \| prosperity. Their first report attracted J much attention and it has now been ex- ' panded into a book, "The Secret of High ! Wages." The authors quote the case of Mr. i'ord, who made motor cars in a tiny workshop with little or no help. He proposes to make 2,000,000 motor care this ! year, by employing 200,000 workers, for I each of whom the minimum day's wage is ) i 29/2. How ie it done?

Mr. Austin and Mr. Lloyd say that it is done by the uniform and enthusiastic application of nini fundamental principles of management: — (1) Promotion by merit only. (2) Increase of bales by reducing prices.

(3) Rapid turnover, which needs less capital. (4) Time and trouble saving appliances which can increase output per man without any assignable limit. • (5) Wages to near <some proportion to output, and no limit to be placed on them. (G) Free exchange of ideas. (7) elimination of waste. Attention to welfare of employees.

(0) Reliance on research and experi ment as means to busineee progress.

Some observers have declared that the men in the Ford shops are overworked. The authors expressly deny this. They cay:—

I "While a first impression* leads one to think that each man is working tremendous preteure, close examination of th; individuals at their work shows this not to be the caec; in point of fact, one is actually deceived in that it is the rapid movement of the machines and part* manufactured and not that of the I men. It is the machines that do the j work —not the men."