GERMAN EFFICIENCY

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 17949, 16 November 1918, Page 9

GERMAN EFFICIENCY

WORLD WEARY <j? CLAIM. KAISER'S PEOPLE MUCH OUTCLASSED. Mr E. T. Adams, author of tho following artiole, which appeared in tho "San Eranciseo Chronicle," is an engineer of national standing, professionally familiar with conditions which he describes. , The world is weary of all this talk of '• German efficiency," with the implication that "efficiency" is typically German or that "German efficiency" is particularly commendable. This J 3 not true. If the German appears to hfi moro efficient than a Erencnraau or an American, it is chiefly because wo give the name "German efficiency " to acts to which other peoples would give a very different name, regardless of whether they are efficiently performed or not. The German performance in Belgium is constantly quoted as a typical instance of German efficiency in making war. Why efficiency? When tho Sicilian saws off his shotgun and, from ambush, kills the neighbour by whom he lias lived and worked for years, we do not say "Sicilian efficiency"- we exclaim, "A Blackhand outrage. Much of this so-called German efficiency, when analysed, shows this samo ruthiessnesaj this samo disregard olf moral values and human rights.

Tho German is super-efficient only when wo pronounce him efficient because of acts which aro jiommonly and rightly considered as ovreonce of moral degeneracy. This war is 'largely to teach the Germans that disregard of tho rights of others is not efficiency.

COMPARISON OF METHODS. Tho German is not more efficient than the American, neither is ho more efficient than jtho Englishman or the men of Franco. It is true that there is probably no class in Geramny so worthless and inefficient as tho thousand** of defectives from the beaten nations of Europe whom we allowed tho German ship owner for his profits to gather together and transport to our shores. But, considered class by class, business men or professional men, mechanics or farmers, I think wo may fairly say that tho American, for example, has dealt as efficiently with his conditions here as has tho Gorman with the simpler problems of an older and more fully developed land. Is German farming carried out more efficiently than American farming? I doubt it. Consider the difference in conditions. The German population of over 300 per square mile as against an American population of less than thirty. Tho German farmer does efficiently, by hand, the labour that his father and his father's father did by hand, and he does it much as they taught him. The American farmer does his farming by machinery which tho American developed, and without winch his crop could neither bo planted nor harvested. By a patient, plodding lifetime of toil, the German chemist lias perfected industries which aro tho wonder of the world. He lacked opportunity to do anything else or he was a foolj ho was not efficient. The .barons of the dye industry aro not chemists; if bo bad been efficient the German chemist would have emigrated to America. FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE UPPER CLASSES.

German efficiency exists chiefly for the benefit of upper classes, for men of. the so-called " upper class," for men of noble birth, men of wealth, or men of special attainments, life in Ger r many is made both pleasant and profitable, and it is made so at the expense of the masses lower in tins social scale- Any "educated German familiar with conditions both here and in Germany will admit that _ the mechanic, the man earning his living by skilled labour, is a fool to remain in Germany, provided be can get to America. I know many Germans, in Germany, who have made this statement. Ido not recall one who contradicted it. The care which is taken by the upper classes to conceal this fact from tho lower classes is no doubt evidence of tho efficiency, or the rathlessness, of the German minority, who control tho Press, tho school end the pulpit to tho extent necessary to enable tho few to exploit the skill and the labour of the many of their fellow-Germans. On the streets of any German city woman with basket and broom are the scavengers behind the horso. Doubtless the Gorman will tell you that it Is efficiency to use women rather than men for this purpose. Travellers in Germany are familiar with the sight of the German woman harnessed with dogs who go daily to market with the produce of tho farm. Thousands of German women aro so employed. The writer has seen them in all parts of the empire. In the German social scale the German peasant woman and the German clog are perhaps not so widely separated as to make this appear unseemly to the Gorman, but we in our country desire no efficiency of this type. MAN VERSUS MAN HIRE LABOUR.

German industries aro not more efficient than Americans. They are different, so different'it is diflicult to compare them. Labour, both common and skilled, is cheaper in Germany than with us. Therefore, Germany has the advantage in those industries where labour enters largely into cost. In America labour of all kinds is high. America has cheaper raw material in many lines, and has a manufacturing advantage in thoso industries where material cost is more important than labour cost, .and especially in those industries where the volume of business b great enough to allow us to secure tho cost reductions. That special labour-saving machinery makes possible where we can attain " quantity production." American industries are specialists in quantity production.

The steel industry is ono of the great German industries, but to an American the steel mills of Thyssen (the Carnegio of Germany); or of Krupps seem small and crude when compared with the mill* and the methods of . the United States Steel Corporation or of Bethlehem. At Gary is a miracle of machinemade material; at Essen i* a miracle of hnnd-mado material. The one is typical of America, the other of Germany. It is evident that "cheap labour" is tho foundation of Gorman Commercial efficiency. And, as.- th(* .Kaiser find his aids pointed out to the Ballins, the Tbyssens or capitalists of Germanv, a fundamental roafnn for this war was that tbprebv Germany was to acquire the coal of Belgium, the iron ores of France, the petroleum, the wheat and the cheap labour of Russia and the Balkans. To the end that raw material and labour may alwavs be chean and therein' the areat of Germany ho .made .greater. This roav be efficiency, but even Germans are not wanting to call it nithlessness.