388 S?TATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



are readily learning the business, and it will not be many campaigns 

 before the American factories will be manned throughout by Ameri- 

 cans. 



The establishment of the factories has exerted a marked influence 

 on the labor market. Emi)]oYment has been given to men, women and 

 children who would otherwise liaA'e been idle. During the months of 

 June and July, and again in October, the factories have given rise to 

 an active denuuid for jjcrsons, i)ossib]y not strong enough to do the 

 hard work of a farm, but able to do light work, to thin, hoe, and harvest 

 the bc^ts. Near most of the factories the su7)j)ly of such labor has 

 not been sufficient. In the campaign of the Michigan Sugar Company 

 in 18t)8, beet raisers found it possible to hire women at from fifty to 

 sixty-five cents a day to thin beets. Later in the season, as the labor 

 supi)ly proved inadequate, these same w'omen, and children as well, 

 asked and received from seventy-five cents to one dollar per day. In 

 1899, about the same city, they have received habitually one dollar per 

 day and dinner. The prices for this class of labor have varied from 

 time to time and in different localities. About Benton Harbor the price 

 per day rose to a dollar and a quarter and board. And about all the 

 factories, in the very busy season, the daily wages rapidly rose to one 

 dollar per day and upward. 



I know of but one case where laborers were brought into the locality 

 from a distance for the express purpose of doing the thinning and hoe- 

 ing. This w'as at Alma, where a lot of men were brought from the 

 city of Detroit to aid in thinning the beets, which, by reason of the 

 extreme wetness of the season, had been too long neglected. Th.e men 

 were unaccustomed to field work, and disappeared at the first opportu- 

 nity. In brief, then, it may be stated that the introduction of the fac- 

 tories has increased both the demand for labor and its value in the 

 market. It has furnished emplo3'ment to a large number of boys that 

 would otherwise have been idlers, and to a possibly still larger number 

 of women who were sorely in need of the money thus earned. Fortu 

 nately, the thinning and hoeing comes for the most part after the close 

 of the common schools, and the topping is over soon after the begin- 

 ning of schools in the fall. Thus the work interferes but little with the 

 school attendance of the children. 



The busy period of thinning and hoeing lasts about forty days, be- 

 ginning in early June, and the harvest, beginning in September, lasts 

 well into November, the lifting and topping occurring in September and 

 October, and the hauling to the factory continuing through to January 

 and even later. 



The plan of furnishing employment during the summer in the fields 

 to the men engaged in the factory in the late fall and winter will be tried 

 this season by one factory. 



My investigations at all the factories convince me that the estab- 

 lishment of this industry has so far resulted in no serious disturbance 

 of economic conditions relating to the labor market. There have been 

 times near all factories when labor has been scarce and exceptionally 

 high prices have been 7)aid. On the whole, however, there has been 

 a fair supply to meet the active demand. Mature laboring men have 

 found remunerative employment, and the congestion of labor in the 

 cities noted in former years has been less conspicuous this season than 



