502 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



XI. Service Incomes in Organized Industry 

 The figures cited in this chapter are far from conclusive. They are, 

 in many cases, woefully incomplete. They cover only a part of the 

 industries in which men and women are gainfully employed. The most 

 surprising thing about the figures is their uniformity. Collected by 

 different organizations, and under essentially varied conditions, the 

 product of general state and federal inquiry and of specific individual 

 wage investigations, the figures agree marvelously. Wages in the west 

 are generally higher than wages in the east.^^ Throughout the country 

 lying east of the Rocky Mountains, and in the industrial sections lying 

 north of the Mason and Dixon Line, the facts appear to be unquestion- 

 able and unquestioned. Subsequent investigation will reveal minor 

 variations, but the large wage facts will still stand as they do in these 

 summaries. 



A comparatively small percentage of the persons gainfully employed 

 in modern organized industry are on a salary basis. Of those so classi- 

 fied, the great proportion are foremen, assistant superintendents and 

 managers, and clerks, whose salaries, for the most part, differ little from 

 the salaries of the better-paid wage-earners. A small proportion of 

 them are paid more than $1,000 per year, and a vanishing number 

 receive more than $1,500. The vast majority of those gainfully em- 

 ployed in organized industry, certainly 95 per cent., are paid a wage 

 or its equivalent. The figures showing that wage appear in the follow- 

 ing brief summary: 



Table X 



Compensation Eates for Males in Certain Groups of Occupations 



The conclusions from these figures are inevitable. The great major- 

 ity (almost nine tenths) of the adult males receive wage rates of $1,000 

 per year, or less. An equal proportion of females receive less than $750. 

 58 "Wages in the United States," op. cit., Chapter 8. 



