tionary; considering the increased cost of living, their real
wages have in fact declined. The clerical force is, with few
exceptions, either of native or of Northern and Western
European birth.
Thus while the wages of Southern and
Eastern European section hands have been raised to meet

DIAGRAM XVIII.

201

10

#2

90

XVIII. Average daily wages of railroad employees, 1891-1909.

the increased cost of living, the salary of the American office clerk has not been advanced.

The Immigration Commission seeks to hold immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe responsible even for the low pay of clerical help:

"There is the general feeling that in so far as the recent

immigrants are entering occupations in which Americans are engaged, they are rendering those occupations undesirable. The American laborer does not care in many cases to work with the 'Hunkie,' and he resents the latter's presence and in many cases transfers his own labor to an occupation such as a clerkship at lower wages.

Thus because the American street laborer deems it beneath his station in life to work side by side with a "Hunkie," he is said to be willing to accept at a sacrifice a more respectable position at a desk in a railway or mining office. The Commission has produced no statistics to show the percentage of clerical employees with a previous experience as section hands and mine laborers. On the other hand, preference for clerical work among the children of American mechanics antedates the advent of the "Hunkie." A discussion of the subject is found in a report of the Illinois Bureau of Labor as far back as 1886. First among the reasons "why the American- ' bred youth seek clerkships" is noted "the distaste of the American youth for the trades."2 Obviously, the Slav and' Italian laborers ought not to be burdened with responsibility for the oversupply of native American labor in clerical pursuits.

No evidence of the alleged tendency of Southern and Eastern European labor to retard the advance of wages can be found in the two basic industries which are generally regarded as representative of the conditions produced by recent immigration-the coal and the iron and steel industry. In the latter, the Immigration Commission finds, ' "the extensive employment of recent immigrants has been attended by an increase in rates of wages due to the general scarcity of labor in the face of the remarkable industrial expansion of recent years."3 This statement should be

Reports of the Immigration Commission, vol. 9, p. 583.

Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Statistics of Labor of the State of Illinois, p. 227.

3 Reports of the Immigration Commission, vol. 9, p. 440.

J

supplemented by the fact, brought to light by the Pitts-
burgh Survey, that while the wages of the Southern and
Eastern European laborers in the steel mills have increased,
the wages of the semi-skilled and skilled men-mostly
Americans or old immigrants of the English-speaking races
-have remained stationary, which is in effect equivalent to
a lowering of the standard of wages; and the money wages of
the labor aristocracy, none of whom are Southern and East-
ern Europeans, have been actually reduced.
The same

tendency is observed in the unionized coal mines of the
Pittsburgh district: the wages of the unskilled men are
much higher than those paid for the same grade of labor in
the steel mills, whereas the wages of the skilled men are the
same in the mills and mines for work of the same class. In
the coal mines, as in the steel mills, unskilled work is done
almost exclusively by Southern and Eastern Europeans,
while the skilled men are mostly of the "English-speaking'
races.2

To be sure, there is a continuous readjustment of wages to prices. The employer of labor seeks to recoup the advance in wages, by advancing the price of his product to the consumer. When the advance in the price of manufactured products becomes general, the wage-earner, as a consumer, is forced in effect to give up a part or all of his gain in the money rate of wages. The increased cost of living then stimulates further demands for advances in wages. Since combinations of capital in all fields of industry have reduced competition among employers of labor to a minimum, the wage-earners have been at a disadvantage in this continuous bargaining. The Immigration Commission holds that the bargaining power of labor has been impaired by "the availability of the large supply of recent immigrant labor," which "has undoubtedly had the effect of preventing an increase of wages to the extent which would have

This subject is specially treated further, in Chapter XX., on the Steel-Workers.

See Chapter XXI., on the Coal Miners.

been necessary had the expansion in the local industries occurred without the availability of the Southern and Eastern Europeans."

Instead of conjecturing what "would have resulted . . from the increased demand for labor," under imaginary conditions, it is safer to inquire what were the actual effects of business prosperity on wages in past American history "without the availability of the Southern and Eastern Europeans." A fair basis for comparison is offered by the Civil War period. "With the exception of the first year, the Civil War period was one of prosperity in manufactures, transportation, mining, and agriculture. Profits were large New woolen factories were opened; many were operated day and night. Dividends of ten to twenty per cent were common; and larger returns were not unknown. "3 On the other hand, the cost of living rose as rapidly as in recent years; though the causes were different, the effect upon the wage-earner's budget was the same. The wage-earners were apparently in a favorable situation: "The war caused an unprecedented drain of workers from the productive industries into the army,"4 whereas immigration dropped during the first two years. 5 The effect of that situation on wages is shown graphically in Diagram XIX., reproduced in part from Chart XII. of

1 Reports, vol. 8, p. 440. The sentence is self-contradictory in form, presuming to state "the effect" which a hypothetical condition "has undoubtedly had", although, as a matter of fact, the combination of causes which "would have" made the effect "necessary" never occurred. This idea is not original with the Immigration Commission. It is referred to in the following terms by Prof. Commons in his report on immigration: "It is possible, of course, that the presence of immigrants in large numbers may prevent wages from reaching as high a level in time of prosperity as they otherwise would reach, but this cannot, in the nature of the case, be demonstrated."-Reports of the Industrial Commission, vol. xv., p. 309.

2 Reports of the Immigration Commission, vol. I, pp. 540-541.

3 Frank Tracy Carlton: The History and Problems of Organized Labor, pp. 52-53. 4 Ibid., p. 51.

s Reports of the Immigration Commission, vol. 1, pp. 79-80.