Row the Eastern Farmer Has Fared. 129 



Now what does the average workman's family receive! 

 In a Massachusetts Labor Report of 1875 Mr. Carroll D. 

 Wright tells of an examination made by the bureau into 

 the condition of 397 families of many manufacturing 

 trades. The fathers of these families earned on an aver- 

 age in a year $574.89. The other members of the 

 family, boys and girls, earned enough to bring the aver- 

 age per family to $762.72. Seven nationalities of wage- 

 earners were included in the 397 families. 



According to the April number of World's Work, 1905, 

 the Bureau of Labor Statistics at Washington has been 

 trying to ascertain what is the increased cost of living. 

 ^'For the jDurpose of its study of the diet of working peo- 

 ple, it inquired into the habits of 13,000 persons who live 

 in cities in thirty-three states. From this study was con- 

 structed an ^average' family, consisting of 5.31 persons. 

 The family income is here found to be $827.19 a year." 



"Part IV of the Annual Eeport of the (Massachusetts) 

 Bureau of Statistics of Labor for 1907, ' ' gives these esti- 

 mates as the average earnings in nine leading industries : 

 males $585.45, females $383.25, young persons $291.39. On 

 the same page, 362, of this report, referring to these esti- 

 mates, it says : ' ' They are substantiated also by the 

 returns of the eleventh census taken for the year ending 

 December, 1904, and for which the average yearly earn- 

 ings for men in Massachusetts were returned as $546.60, 

 women $343.58, and children $227.11, the difference in 

 wages for women and children being somewhat affected 

 by the age limit, which was x)laced at sixteen by the cen- 

 sus and twentv-one bv the schedule for annual statistics 

 of manufactures." 



It is evident from these various reports from the best 

 authorities that the farmer's family for its labor receives 



9 



