Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1917 edition. Excerpt: ...computed. VOL. II--22 comes the duty of the capitalist to raise the wages of his workmen to the level required by justice, irrespective of whether the profits of the concern are high or low or whether some shareholder capitalists might as a result be left without their dividend. It is not merely the wage of the labourer that constitutes, as we have said, a first charge on an industry, and that requires to be allowed for and paid before the net profits begin to be computed, but the just wage of the labourer, for no other wage has a right to be considered as fulfilling the terms of the contract which we are here discussing. The conclusion to which this discussion leads is as follows: capitalists who deny an increase of wages to their men when such increase in manifestly necessary in order to bring wages up to the just level, or who deny it until work is struck by the labourers, are guilty of a gross injustice to their men. The strike is a very disastrous thing, disastrous particularly for the labourer; and capitalists, who, rather than raise the men's wages of their own accord, will permit a strike to occur are guilty of a two-fold injustice, first, the injustice of withholding a just wage; and secondly, the injustice of compelling the men to undergo great misery in defence of what is their clear right. But there is a duty on the other side also. We have seen what the wages-contract is. To the workmen a fixed and a just wage, to the capitalist the varying profits. The workmen, therefore, should not clamour for an increase of wages as soon as the profits rise. They have a right to a share in the risen profits in one case only, the case, viz. in which the increased profits are due to a large extent to increased work put on the workmen. If...
