82 THE RURAL PROBLEM 



of cottage property will rise to 5s., which would necessitate 

 a wage of at least 25s. a week for their inmates. In view of 

 the difficulty of raising wages to this figure immediately, a 

 scheme of state-aided cottage building is foreshadowed by 

 which rents would not exceed 3s. a week, and if this scheme 

 were adopted, a minimum wage of 23s. a week would meet 

 the immediate needs of the case. To discourage casual labour, 

 the wages should be 25s. a week if the engagement is for less 

 than a year, and 5s. a day if the engagement is for less than a 

 week. The week should be limited to fifty hours, and over- 

 time should be paid at a higher rate. 



This reform is pressing, and is immediately practicable; the 

 only modification being, as already suggested, that backward 

 districts might, if the Local Wages Board thought fit, apply 

 for a short extension of the period before the law was enforced 

 in their district. In the interim the Local Board would, of 

 course, arrange for a local minimum at a reduced rate. 



§ 4. The Effect on the Farmer. 



In the long run it would prove true in agriculture, as in 

 every other industry, that better pay means better work. 

 The best authorities admit that in agricultural districts 

 where a fair wage is now paid the work done is proportionately 

 better, and the higher wage throws no extra expense on the 

 employer. Mr. Christopher Turnor, for example, has 

 given it as his opinion that the better-paid labour on 

 his estate in Lincolnshire is less expensive than the 

 far worse paid work of the labourers of Oxfordshire and 

 Dorsetshire. But, however true this may be, the same 

 result cannot be expected to obtain immediately if wages 

 are raised by Act of Parliament. The process of improving 

 the value of the work done to the same extent as the 

 increased wage might take a generation, while the increased 

 cost of labour would immediately fall on the farmer. 



It is difficult to estimate with any degree of certainty 

 what that increased cost would be. In any given case it 

 depends on three factors — the wage at present paid, the 

 kind of farming, and the number of acres per labourer on 



