HIGH PAY, LOW PRICE

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 129, 1 June 1926, Page 8

HIGH PAY, LOW PRICE

People are so used to \ hearing that wages and prices rise, or fall, together, that the attention is arrested'by the spectacle of rising wages and falling prices, attributed 'to America on tho authority of an article in the "Spectator." The case is put forward in an address —reported elsewhere in thk issue—by a director of Messrs. Wright , Stephenson and C 0.,. Mr. J. A. Johnstone, at the Company'b annual meeting. The argument in effect is that higher wage, higher production, and lower prico have coincided. That is a consummation to be expected if the principle that "the more the worker produces,- tho more he enjoys" is, in average conditions, operative. Exponents of1 this principle teach that the great bulk of the efforts of wage-paid workers is directed to producing commodities for the use or consumption of the people, consisting mainly of other workers; therefore, the more commodities the worker outputs, the more ! there will be for the public (and the j workers) to benefit by; and plenitude will express itself in terms of lower price. In ■ tho opposito camp are enemies of tho present sacial order, who affirm that increased production is in some way side-tracked into private profit by extortioner-employers; that is' benefits do not reach the public; that the worker toils, yet the community is not served.' As an answer to such suggestions that higher. production is necessarily nullified by ,employer-ox-ploitation, nothing could be more effective than just that concurrence of phenomena reported, from the United States, where observers note "two apparently contradictory results—the standard of living has been raised to an extraordinary degree (which moans that wages have risen) and, as a twin result, prices, have aunk." How could prices have fallen unless the higher wages wcro accompanied by higher output? And if the producing of more commodities made commodities cheaper, where does the "contradictory" eleinenf come in? The quoted citation of results does not appear to be contradictory except in so far as it contradicts the contention that a general iucreaso in industrial output is, always nullified by j the greod of employers or by the manipulation of speculators. A big section of trade unionism, in the Old Country years ago' turned its back on tho religion that tho more the worker assists' iin promoting industrial production, the1 more will he and his enjoy the fruits thereof. "Worship was made at the altar., of tho idol of "ca' canny," or "limitation of output." But this idolatry tho American workers, generally speaking, have not practised, Aiid how; do ttio two policies

compare? According to the "Spectator's" figures, as quoted by Mr. Johnstone; the United States eclipses Britain both in the upward curve of wages and the downward curve of prices. Until these figures are falsified or explained away, they will stand as a striking indication of something superior in the American method. They" are prima facie evidence of an industrial output the cheapening effects of which have not been intercepted by exploiters Or speculators, and1 have not been neutralised by the increased purchasing power of a high-wage populace, but have been successfully passed on to the community. To get such ,& result no doubt needed efficiency in the employer as well.as in the employee; and it must not be forgotten—especially when the British coal-mining dispute is before the public—that mechanical equipment, organisation, and scientific methods play a big part in American output. But the. broad fact remains that, whether the evil of "ca' canny" in Britain is a disease afflicting both sides or only one, America is flourishing under a system which recognises the wisdom of payment by results. The Americans have not turned thoir back on the idea of higher wages, lower costs, more comforts, and —perhaps most important—more savings to enable the ambitious worker to become a shareholder.. Bolshevism-hates a, capitalism that continually recruits the "bourgeoisie" with the best elements from the "proletarians." The hundreds of thousands of small shareholders in banks are their greatest bulwark;'and it is in a high wage, high output country like America that smallshareholding can wfeld its highest influence. If the social contract is not a partnership, it is nothing. America benefits by the fact that both the partners are solidly at work, and that.both o£ them are attaining satisfactory results for themselves—and, incidentally, for the great■ inarticulate .public.