156 ASSOCIATION OF IRON, STEEL AND TIN WORKERS [288 



ried on. These deliberations may continue longer than one 

 month by mutual consent of the parties concerned. It is 

 understood that there shall be no interruption of work dur- 

 ing the life of an agreement. This plan is in effect with 

 both the Western Bar Iron Association and the Republic. 



Professor Marshall, in discussing the question as to how 

 far it is possible for frank dealing in a friendly spirit be- 

 tween employers and employed to remove those unfair 

 dealings, and suspicions of unfair dealings, which are the 

 chief causes of industrial war, agrees that " the best method 

 is that of conciliation " ; and that, " for the settlement . . . 

 of a price list for a wide area, a well thought out sliding 

 scale seems to be the best means attainable under our pres- 

 ent social conditions."*" Conciliation, when thoroughly es- 

 tablished and recognized, may pave the way for what may 

 be called the automatic regulation of wages by sliding 

 scales. Sliding scales, while by no means perfect,*^ are 

 theoretically a step in advance of the methods now gener- 

 ally in use. The principle on which they are based is that 

 wages are to vary according to the selling price of the 

 product.*^ This general plan admits of considerable va- 

 riety in application. But it usually provides that wages 

 shall not decline below a certain point. ^^ The employer is 

 free to sell his material lower than this minimum, but he 

 can not reduce wages below it. By this method, then, the 

 ■laborer shares in the advance and the decline of the price 

 of the product. 



The chief advantages of these sliding scales may be said 

 to lie on the one hand in their elasticity, and on the other 



*" L. L, Price, Industrial Peace. Preface, p. xvi flF. 



*' See A. C. Pigou's estimate of Sliding Scales, Principles and 

 Methods of Industrial Peace, pp. 137-146. 



••2 For an exhaustive definition of the sliding scale, see J. E. C. 

 Munro, Sliding Scales in the Coal and Iron Industries, p. 6. 



*^ The chief objections to the scale of the South Wales Miners 

 was — in the words of the men — that "the confounded thing had no 

 bottom" (W. J. Ashley, The Adjustment of Wages, p. 54). 



