The Hawera Star. SATURDAY, JANUARY 23, 1926. A MIRACLE OF CAPITALISM.

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 23 January 1926, Page 4

The Hawera Star.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 23, 1926. A MIRACLE OF CAPITALISM.

Delivered every evening by 6 o’clock in Hftvern, Manaia, Normanby, Okaiawa, Elthara, Mangotoki, Kaponga, Alton, Hurleyville, Patea, Waverley, Mokoia, Wbakamara, Obangai. ■ Mer-imcra, Fraser Bead, aDd x rarata.

That heading is not original; out wo make no apology for borrowing it from tho Spectator (London), since it sums up in one potent phrase the arguments of an arresting article on the comparative relations between Capital and Labour in Great Britain and in the United States of America. We have had occasion in this column previously to refer to the marked difference in the methods of British Labour and American Labour; the one throws sand in the wheels of industry, tho other lubricates them. Tho disgruntled British trades unionist imagines that his employer pays his wages; the workman knows that his product pays his. The consequence is that while the Britisher is kicking against the pricks, or sitting in sullen idleness, his American cousin is driving to work in his own motor-car. And here may wc make ourselves clear on two points? Not for one moment is it suggested that the disgruntled unionist is representative of British workmen; but his ideas are founded on the ideas of the industrial Labour movement, and it is he who, riding roughshod over the quieter and more steady-going of his fellows, makes all the trouble. All'the trouble on one side, that is; for—and this is our second point of explana-tion-—the employer or employer’s supporter who flies into a rage at every mention of trades unionism is equally to blame for industrial upheavals. If there be hot-headed Radicals on one side, just as surely are there thickheaded reactionaries on the other. The trades unions occupy a prominent and important place in British industrial history. Before their advent last century, the condition of affairs in some of the factories and mines of Great Britain was little removed from slavery. Not only the standard of life of the workers, but also the fair name of Britain, owes much to the earlier successes of the trades union movement. The trouble to-day, if we may say so, is that the leaders of industrial Labour, knowing what trades unionism meant to their forefathers, close their eyes to present needs and present conditions. The mission of the trades unions has been to better the lot of the worker; but, happily, times have changed until, as conditions of work and pay are now, the old-time methods are out of place. The need for the union, with its power of collective bargaining, is greater, probably, than ever before; but the use of the trades unions as a battering ram for the attempted destruction of the present social and economic system is a grave error of judgment. The unionist himself must begin to doubt when he compares conditions in Great Britain and America. To use a somewhat clumsy illustration, British and American workmen are like two groups of boys who have happened upon two unclaimed < ricket sets (representing the capitalistic system). Tho British bovs do not believe in cricket, their leaders have convinced them that it is not a lit game for them to play; so they are sitting down vainly endeavouring to reshape the bats and stumps into tennis racquets—and getting nowhere. The American gang, on the other hand, resolved to make the most of things as it has found them, has already mastered tho miles of cricket and is having a first-class time at play. The British workman is being taught to regard the capitalistic system as his sworn enemy, and lie is doing his best to hinder its functioning. The American workman has found it to his advantage to co-operate with capitalism and, in a small way, to become a capitalist himself. Wages in the United States are so high as to make some oldfashioned British (and colonial) employers shudder. Yet astonishingly cheap articles are produced, partly by standardisation and mass production, but at least equally by the eager willingness of the manual worker to cooperate with his employer. For the contrast with Britain, we cannot do belter than quote from the Spectator’s art icle:

By rapid production overhead charges are greatly' reduced. It is a strange fact, that tho backward employer in Groat Britain has always overlooked this elementary' fact. Take the case of a factory where payment is by results. If a particular workman was turning out articles very' fast ho, of course, earned wages i ii proportion. The old-fashioned employer then used to say: "This will never do. Hern’s a man earning such high wages that if they become general they will ruin my r business. Evidently' I have fixed the rate too high. I must cut it down.’’ Accordingly' he did cut it down. He never considered the fact that the fast worker who produced in one day what the ordinary worker produced in, say. a day and a half, was saving to tin l firm a man’s share of half a day’s charges for tho upkeep and direction of the factory'. When employers cut down the rate of pay under, a system of payment by results the only practical retort the men could make was to work slowly in order not to appear to be earning too much. .Small blame to them! On this point at least there has been general enlightenment among American employers for a long time. The typical American . employer will watch with pride his men arriving at the works in their own motor-cars. He will rub his hands with satisfaction as lie reflects on this evidence of prosperity in his industry'. If things were managed in America as they arc here the more the capitalist was

pleased with his results the more the wage-earners would be displeased with the capitalist. But it is not so; in America both parties to the transaction grow rich together.

Twenty years ago in the United States public enmity was being built up against the trusts and big corporations. Act of Congress was spoken of as the only way of dealing, with this '‘menace’’ to the ordinary people. But now the trusts have been, if not made harmless, at least shorn of their menacing properties, by a much more simple method —by the growing readiness of the workers to invest in the industries in which they are employed, and so to become part owners of the trusts. That is the .Spectator’s “miracle of capitalism.’’ Before it can be accom plished in Britain, concessions and withdrawals will bo necessary on both sides; but until it can be accomplished in Britain, the Old Land will have little hope in the industrial race with Ame-rica—-nor will the British workman be anything like so prosperous as the American workman.