MICHIGAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 55 



agreement. (*l-3.) Some of the officials defended the eight hour day 

 entirely on this basis. 



Just as the eight hour day determines the length of a fair day's 

 work the minimum wage and the time system of payment determine 

 what constitutes a fair day's pay. The lime system of jiayment is 

 universal in its application in Chicago with the carpenters. This 

 means that the journeymen work by the hour and are paid 65 cents 

 for the work done during that time. Under this system, the practice 

 of taking work by the job, i. e., lump or contract, and by the piece is 

 positively prohibited. They claim that lump work, contract work, 

 or piece work results in undercutting and that it is impossible to 

 maintain any standard of work or pay under this system of pay- 

 ment. (*38.) As they express their feeling upon their experience, 

 ''piece work would kill any trade." (*38.) Their generalization 

 upon tliis subject is probably too broad but it expresses their atti- 

 tude and experience. 



With such a definition of what constitutes a fair day's work and 

 long established custom with respect to the amount of work a 

 man should do in an hour, it can be assumed that the carpenters 

 effectively control the standards of work and pay. 



I have already shown that they demand a standard unit of 

 measurement. The justice of this demand is apparent to the con- 

 tractors, so that it has been inserted in the agreement for some 

 years without any dispute, for without this standard the flood-gate 

 of underbidding would be opened. Some journeymen and officers 

 think that the ''minimum" wage of 65 cents applies to the least 

 efficient and the more efficient get more. Others think the minimum 

 of 65 cents is probably almost universal and represents what the 

 union can successfully get from the employers. Again others think 

 the minimum wage is 65 cents because it "costs that much to live." 

 (*20, 21.), and still others take the opposite view, namely, that the 

 cost of living is what it is because the minimum wage is 65 cents, 

 r.nd that this minimum "is no more nor less than an expression of 

 what we can get." (*19.) Another officer expressed this when he 

 said, "we never did nor never could argue for a higher wage on the 

 basis of getting a living wage. First we don't believe a living wage- 

 is enough and secondly we want more. Are we just to get a living 

 out of life? Are we not entitled to get more than that?" (*19.) 

 ''How can a man with a job at 65 cents argue that he is not getting 

 a living wage without being ridiculed even though he only gets that 

 eight or nine months in the year? The living wage argument as- 

 sumes that there is a limit at which workmen are satisfied, which 

 is not true." (*10, 20.) 



