The Waikato Times With which is Incorporated. The Waikato Argus. FRIDAY, JULY 27, 1928. THE LAND OF SELF-HELP.

Waikato Times, Volume 104, Issue 17465, 27 July 1928, Page 6

The Waikato Times With which is Incorporated. The Waikato Argus. FRIDAY, JULY 27, 1928. THE LAND OF SELF-HELP.

A year or two ago the industrial organisation of the United States was being held up to the world's admiration- Here peace and freedom had learned 'to lie down together like the lion and the lamb in the Millennium. Unfortunately the picture w’as soon spoiled by violent industrial disputes—more violent than the worst in Britain —and hy revelations of an alarming amount of unemployment. Nevertheless, if the test of excelle: cc is that a land should have Lho greatest number of self-made men and the greatest opportunities for self-help, then we shall hardly find another to vie with the United Slates. These opportunities of climbing the ladder of wealth and social eminence make employees somewhat careless of the gains to be won by unionism, and they make many employers ruthless in their resistance to unionism. The difference between the Old World and America in this regard is brought out by Air H. B. Butler, deputy director of the International Labour Office at Geneva, in a report prepared after a visit to the United States last year. It has often been remarked, says Air Butler, both by Americans themselves and by foreign observers, that the American workman adopts a different attitude towards his employers and towards his associates from that of the workmen of other countries. The atmosphere of a new country, in which possibilities arc still enormous, class divisions as yet barely perceptible and the process of social crystallisation only beginning, naturally breeds a different outlook in the worker from that which prevails in countries which have reached the limit of their expansion and where the social hierarchy has been solidified for generations. No doubt frequent instances could he found in most countries of men who have gone from the bottom to the top of the industrial ladder, but in America they are far more numerous than elsewhere; Alany workmen still feel that they may in their turn become a Ford or a Swift or a Rockefeller, if they can save some money and a little luck conies their w’ay. Moreover, industry is swelling so fast that even without any special good fortune the ordinary worker may hope for promotion far more reasonably than can the worker where the rate of economic growth is less meteoric. As a consequence not only has he a stronger belief in his own capacity to rise in the social scale, but the obstacles to his doing so are less formidable. Hence the worker is less inclined to become “class-conscious” than in the older countries. lie does not feel that lie and bis fellow workers are all in the same boat, destined to sink or swim together. lie thinks that, without their aid, lie may better his position by his own exertions.

However, conditions are changing. The opportunity for rapid advancement in America depended largely on three tilings—progress of invenlion, the occupying of undeveloped land, and the exploiting of cheap labour. The days

of free land and cheap labour are passing. One hears hut little mention of low wages in that country, yet it is a fact that the large fortunes have been built up in great measure from the profits on the poorly-paid services of immigrant labourers. How completely these people were at the mercy of the employers was shown strikingly by Upton Sinclair in “The Jungle.” The more sedate and judicial statements of Air Butler’s official report are hardly less convincing. After referring to the rapid rate of immigration—more than a million a year between 1907 and 1914—lie says: “As each generation became merged in the national life, it was iOllowed by a fresh flood of strangers, most of them accustomed to a mode of living far below those of the American-horn workman, glad to accept wages which he would regard as inadequate to sustain himself and his family, often ignorant of the first principles of industrial association and almost beyond the reach of organisation owing to their inability to comprehend the speech of the organiser. Strike meetings at which the orator has required ten or lifiecn interpreters are commonplaces in American industrial history.” Ignorance of the English language, oftijn combined with complete illiteracy, places the immigrant at the mercy of the unscrupulous employer, and these same drawbacks make the creation of any effective plan for representation of the workpeople in the plant management extremely difficult. Not only the immigrants but the Negroes and the “poor whites” of the south-eastern States (over 600,000 of whom in 1920 were unable to read and write) have provided the source of low-waged, ignorant workers. Their presence has made possible in some industries a

despotism of the employing class that is unthinkable in Britain or New Zealand or the countries of Western Europe. But now the Negroes are attaining more independence, and immigration is being severely checked. The outcome'will almost certainly be that careers of fortune-hunting will become more difficult and that the workers will realise more fully their community of interests. It must not be thought that all employers have taken lull advantage of the disunion of the workers and the ignorance of a large section. On the contrary, a few, including some of the largest corporations, have anticipated the unions in schemes for the emancipation of wage-earners and for their higher welfare. Air Butler tells in his report of firms that have schemes of life-insurance, accident insurance, superannuation and (in a few cases) unemployment insurance. In most parts of the United States the Government makes no provision for old age, so the schemes of the companies are the more needed. Some of the largest companies also promote shareholding hy employees and still more have schemes of employee representation in the management. In fact the movement towards employee representation is so strong that Air Butler devotes to it a special chapter. Some workers dislike the schemi as it is often associated with hostility to unionism, but a few firms are now ready to recognise the unions besides promoting the co-operative spirit in their own works. However, all these progressive movements are on the part of a minority, as Air Butler shows. The majority of American employers still seek lo take full advantage of their power and lo prevent collective action on the part of the workers. In New Zealand the workers in general have received far better treatment. Probably in both countries the trend of the future will be towards co-operation. While the habit of absolute dictation to the workers in the United States hinders progress in this direction, that country is far ahead of New Zealand in the number of its co-operative experiments. We may well be pleased that New Zealand gives more justice to Hie toilers, but wo should not despise the lessons that America lias to teach-