Laborers have been segregated into a separate group for the reason that an increase or decrease among them is likely to be affected by a difference in the method of classification as much as by real economic changes. The comparative importance of these five groups appears from Table 41. The Massachusetts census draws no distinction between native-born of native and of foreign parentage. 'On the whole, native breadwinners show a greater increase than foreign-born. TABLE 41. INCREASE (+) AND DECREASe (−) of the NUMBER OF BREADWINNERS IN MASSACHUSETTS CLASSIFIED BY SEX, NATIVITY, AND OCCUPATION GROUPS (THOUSANDS), 1900-1905.1 Native Foreign-born Total +79.9-17.3 -7.7 -2.8 +1.0 +53.1 +1.1 +0.6 +97.0 Male: Native +48.9 -12.8 -7.7 -2.7 +0.5 +26.2 Foreign-born -0.4 +30.7 The increase of the native-born is greatest where the increase of the foreign-born is greatest. On the contrary a substantial decrease of native-born breadwinners is found in the second group of occupations where the number of 1 Occupations at the XII. Census, Table 34, pp. 154 ff., and Table 41, pp. 300-305. Census of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 1905, vol. ii., Occupations, Table I., pp. 9–117. foreign-born likewise shows a large decrease. The gains of the foreign-born at the expense of the native and vice-versa are insignificant. The decrease of native breadwinners in all occupations aggregated 27,800 persons, but it was offset by a net increase of 80,900 in all other classes of manual labor and clerical occupations, that is to say the loss of one position was compensated by the gain of three. No account is taken here of the increase of native-born breadwinners in business and professional service. As stated above, it is uncertain whether the decrease of the number of laborers was due to industrial changes or to the whims of statistical classification. The details for all other occupations showing a decrease of the number of native breadwinners are given in Table 42. TABLE 42. SPECIFIED OCCUPATIONS IN MASSACHUSETTS WITH A DECREASING NUMBER OF NATIVE BREADWINNERS, CLASSIFIED BY SEX AND NATIVITY, • Includes bakers, blacksmiths, brick and tile makers, confectioners, coopers, gunsmiths, locksmiths and bell hangers, harness and saddle As appears from the preceding table, the only possible "displacement" of native- by foreign-born did not exceed 2800 breadwinners in five years, which was less than 3 per cent of the increase of native-born in all occupations exclusive of business and professional service. The total number of immigrant breadwinners who gave Massachusetts as their destination in 1901-1905 reached 220,000 persons of both sexes. Assuming that 2800 native hucksters and peddlers, boatmen, and sailors, etc., were virtually displaced by the immigrants, we find that the measure of "displacement" was equal to one native for every seventyeight immigrants. These results disclose no material change in the racial make-up of the industrial forces during the first five years of the present century; what was true in 1900 remained so as late as 1905. The immigrants did not "crowd" the native wage-earners, but were absorbed in those occupations where native workers found employment in increasing numbers. Actual "displacement" was a negligible quantity. makers and repairers, hostlers, marble and stone cutters, masons (brick and stone), meat and fruit canners, packers, etc., millers, shirt, collar and cuff makers, stewards, and wheelwrights. 3 Includes brassworkers, cabinet makers, candle, soap, and tallow makers, copper workers, engravers, paper hangers, rope and cordage factory operatives, sail, awning, and tent makers, tobacco and cigar operatives, and upholsterers. • Annual Reports of the Commissioner-General of Immigration: 1901, p. 17, Table VIII.; 1902, p. 29, Table IX.; 1903, p. 32, Table IX.; 1904, p. 30, Table IX.; 1905, p. 34, Table IX. CHAPTER VIII EMIGRATION FROM NORTHERN AND WESTERN EUROPE A. Introductory HE great influx of Italian, Slav, and Jewish immigrants since 1890 coincides with a decrease of immigration from Northern and Western Europe. This coincidence has been generally accepted as proof that immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe has checked the current of "more desirable" immigration from Northern and Western Europe. This assertion has been clothed in the scientific garb of "the Gresham law of immigration"; bad immigration, it is said, tends to drive out good immigration. The cum hoc, ergo propter hoc method of reasoning has scarcely ever appeared so undisguised as in this newly discovered "law." No attempt has been made to inquire into the conditions of the countries from which the "old immigration" was drawn, with a view to ascertaining, if possible, whether there were any causes tending to check emigration from those countries. It has been shown in Chapter IV. that in the long run immigration bears an almost constant relation to the population of the United States. Inasmuch, however, as the latter increases faster than the population of Europe, especially that of the emigration countries, the rate of emigration from those countries must increase much faster than their population in order to supply the industries of the United States with the number of immigrants they can employ. Yet the sources of emigration are not unlimited. We may speak, metaphorically, of a Slav "invasion," but such figures of speech merely obscure the real nature of present-day phenomena. The Norman invaders of a thousand years ago financed their expeditions by robbing the peaceable population on their way. All they needed was the spirit of adventure. To-day that spirit alone will not carry their descendants across the ocean. The funds for emigration must be raised by the emigrants themselves, or by their relatives and friends. The volume of emigration from a given country can, therefore, not increase beyond a certain limit set by the size of its population. When that point is reached, further industrial expansion in the United States must draw upon the labor supply of other countries. During the ten-year period 1881-1890 the countries of Northern and Western Europe furnished 72 per cent of the total immigration to the United States.' This period included the years of the maximum immigration from Germany and the Scandinavian countries and of the greatest immigration from the United Kingdom since the Irish famine of the '40's of the past century. To maintain the same ratio to the total immigration of the past decade, 1901-1910, the countries of Northern and Western Europe should have furnished six and one third million immigrants, i. e., two thirds more than in 1881-1890. In order to replace the immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe that were absorbed by the industrial expansion of the past decade, immigration from Northern and Western Europe should have risen 117 per cent above the highest water-mark reached in 1881-1890. During the same period the population of Ireland decreased 14 per cent, and the population of the other countries of Northern and Western Europe increased from 12.5 to 25.2 per cent. Unless we allow ourselves to be I * Reports of the Immigration Commission, vol. 1, Table 6, pp. 61-63. The rates of increase for each of the principal countries were as follows: |