Fixing a Minimum Wage

*THE WORKER*

Brisbane, January 26, 1895.

The Editorial Mill.

Our Motto: Socialism in our time.”

One of the most important addresses at the late Science Congress in this city – indeed the most important, for it most directly concerns the welfare of the large wage-earning class – was that by Professor Scott on “ Fixing a Minimum wage.” The professor is of opinion that the old “laissez-faire” doctrine – the Let Alone theory of the manchester school of politicians the freedom of contract principle so strongly enunciated by the federated employers of Australasia a few years ago has not led to the best results, and it will probably “be greed,” he remarks, “that the wages of some workers, as settled by free bargaining, are lower than is desirable.” He than asks “can anything be done to mitigate that evil? The only complete and final remedy would be to raise the low-paid workers to a higher standard of efficiency, and thereby make their present wages may be an indispensable means to this, for this class is at once poor because inefficient, and inefficient because poor. Can Governments do anything to raise such wages as we may consider too low? In the first place Governments can (and Australian Governments do) – pay to their own employ'es, in some cases, wages above the lowest rate at which they could get work done . . . . Secondly, Governments can fix a minimum wage above the lowest competition rates in public contracts. This has recently been done by the London County Council and the New South Wales Department of Public works.” Proceeding, Professor Scott asks “Is it possible and expedient in the general interest to fix a minimum wage in private employment also? That must be done, if at all, either by trade unions or by Government. Every trade union seeked to do it for its own members. So far as the increased wages come out of employers' profits that can bear some diminution, there is probably more good than harm done. It must be remembered that prices cannot follow wages, but wages must follow prices. If then anything is to be done for the class that needs help most it must be done by the Government.”

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This remarkable utterance raises the whole question of State interference. Either trade unions or Government must fix a minimum wage below which no man, woman, boy or girl shall be employed , as it is the height of folly to expect either the greedy or embarrassed employer to pay even a living remuneration for work done. Up to the present, generally speaking, trade unions have been able to raise the wages and standard of comfort directly in all organised occupations, and this has had an indirect beneficial effect in others unorganised. But the working classes are now confronted with a new tyrant, not the individual harsh employer, but a mass of them against which for many reasons it is difficult to contend at all, and successfully only in a few isolated cases such as the Queensland bushmen whose desperation sometimes hinders the federated pastoralists from going too far. The unorganised or non-union occupations, trades, and professions out number the union occupations, and those who follow them are powerless because unorganised. Somebody or something must aid them. The unions cannot help them much, for they have enough to do to hold their own. Some factor must step in “ to prevent the wages of those workers from being settled by free bargaining at a lower rate than is desirable.” The press is powerless, being controlled by those to whose interest it is to reduce wages; the pulpit must be silent, muchly for the same reason, therefore the only persons in a position to do anything to raise the wages of the ill-paid workers are the members of Parliament operating through the Government of the country.

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It is seventy years since the English parliament discontinued fixing the rate of wages – a practice which began with the notorious Statute of labourers under Edward III. - and the anti-Socialist will view with much apprehension the growing public opinion in favour of a renewal of this class of State interference. There is a considerable difference, however, between the modern proposal to establish a minimum wage and the wage legislation from Edward III. onwards, the former being a movement to keep up the rate of pay, the latter to keep it down. One is distinctly for Labour, the other against. It was a scarcity of workers which gave rise to the one; it is a plethora of unemployed which prompts the other. At the time of the initiation of the Edward III. statutes England had been devastated by the “Black Death,” the most terrible plague the world ever witnessed. Of the three or four millions who then formed the population of England more than one-half were swept away. In the burial ground purchased by Sir Walter Manny for the citizens of London more than fifty thousand corpses are said to have been interred. Nearly sixty thousand people perished at Norwich, while at Bristol the living were hardly able to bury the dead. The Black Death fell on village as on town. The whole organisation of labour was thrown out of gear. “The sheep and cattle strayed through the fields and corn, and there were none left who could drive them.” After the first burst of the panic a sudden rise in wages took place consequent on the enormous diminution in the supply of labour, and for the first time in history, says Green, there revealed itself the struggle between Capita and Labour.

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To meet this demand for higher wages, authorities, on behalf of their propertied friends, who then as now “bossed the parliamentary show. “enacted the Statute of Labourers. This Act ordained that every man and woman able in body and within the age of threescore, not living in merchandise nor exercising any craft, not having of his own whereof to live nor land about whose tillage he might employ himself, nor serving any other, should be bound to serve at the accustomed wages ruling before the plague. No employer was to pay more than the old wages upon pain of forfeiting double what they paid; if the workman took more he was to be committed to gaol, the overplus wages to go to the king's use. Carters and ploughmen and other servants were to serve by the whole year or by other usual terms, and not by the day. No labourer was to leave town so long as there was work for him to do. Cordwainers and shoemakers were not to sell boots or shoes in any other manner than they were wont in the twentieth year of the reign of Edward III. Saddlers, blacksmiths, and tailors were directed not to charge more than usual prior the year 1348.

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These laws to compel workmen to remain in a town or village, to accept a lower rate than they desired were, of course, not altogether successful, if some people are cunning enough and fortunate they can break any law ever made; as a matter of fact all bad laws will be broken and fall into disuse if not repealed as soon as the public mind is alive to their injustice. There were many instances where employers found it to their advantage to give more money than allowed by the statute of labourers, but in the majority of cases the law to keep down wages had its desired effect. It would possibly happen that in some cases a Minimum Wage Act would be infringed, and individuals would work for less than the law directed should be paid them. That, however, would be a trifling objection to the Act. Most of those who came under the operation of the Act would be benefited , and when this is the result of any law, legislators may rest assured they have done good work. The greatest happiness of all is a good motto:; the greatest good to the greatest number is better, and doubtless when the second is observed, the first stands an excellent chance of being closely followed. Modern governments should should know this; the people in their sane moments, when unblinded by jealousy of their own aspiring labour citizens, recognise that it contains a sound principle, and will doubtless soon compel the Governments to discard “the greatest good for the few” in its favour. There is probably only one small school of thinkers who now-a-days deny the right of the State to interfere to protect its weakest members; and, when once the people see the practicability of the proposals, it will not be long before the Minimum Wage becomes law in this country. We shall, without a doubt, have to follow in the foot-steps of other countries in first applying the principle to Government contracts and municipal employment, but it is only a question of a few years when the Queensland Government will find it necessary, in order to hold office, to prevent the heartless operation of freedom of contract by fixing a living wage, below which employers dare not go without risking very heavy penalties. The WORKER regards the minimum wage question as on a par with the unemployed problem, and deems the address of the president of the economic section at the Australasian Science Congress one of the most encouraging signs of the times, for it is plain that Socialistic thought is not confined to the out of work or tottering business man. When the professors commence to talk “Socialism in our time” a change in the politics of this “field for the British investor” is not a thousand years distant.