839] Machinery and Labor 41 



rate of wages for work in his accustomed employment 

 or to enter as an inexperienced workman, in some 

 other employment at, most' likely, a still lower 

 rate of wages. His compensating advantage is an 

 uncertain one and one hard to estimate. Besides, it 

 does not ordinarily accrue until the time of his greatest 

 need is passed. 1 It arises from the decreased market 

 price of the commodity which he formerly helped to 

 produce. If it is a commodity which enters into his 

 own consumption then the lower price which he pays 

 for it, will in a measure, off-set the lower wage which 

 he receives in his new occupation. If it is not a commod- 

 ity which enters into his own consumption then his 

 compensating advantage must come through the stimu- 

 lus which the decreased price of this particular commod- 

 ity gives to other industries in which it is employed as 

 "raw material" or, more properly, as a factor of produc- 

 tion. Cheaper " raw material " yielding, of course, a 

 decreased cost of production, higher profits, and a 

 stronger demand for labor. 2 



1 " It is small consolation to a working man to be assured that in a 

 year's time he will have plenty of work, if in the meantime he must 

 remain breadless. Loss of work even for a few weeks may exhaust 

 his credit and the affection and means of his friends, and there may 

 remain nothing for him but starvation, unless poor-laws or private 

 charity come to the rescue." Nicholson : Effects of Machinery on 

 Wages, p. 30. 



2 " Labor-saving methods seem to be a calamity, because the effect 

 is to interfere with present pursuits and deprive some of their ac 

 customed means of livelihood ; to render useless, skill acquired after 

 a lifelong training. The benefits all seem to accrue to the person who 

 first uses an invention, while the ones displaced are apparently shut 

 out of the industrial system. It is not noticed how they are gradually 

 absorbed into other channels of employment that open up as the cost 

 of production is decreased. If such were not the case, the whole in- 

 dustrial mechanism would soon come to a standstill, considering the 

 progress of inventions supplemented by the army of aliens that arrive 

 yearly and the increasing proportion of women breadwinners." 

 Henry White: "The Problem of Machinery" in The American 

 Federationist, Vol. X, page 83. 



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