158 ASSOCIATION OF IRON, STEEL AND TIN WORKERS [29O 



fessor Munro urged, as to perhaps the most important of 

 these contentions, that the scale may, and ought to take 

 into account those elements in the cost of production which 

 are subject to considerable variations. 



, In one important respect, a sliding scale is superior to 

 other forms of wage adjustment. It automatically obviates 

 disputes growing out of changes in the general level of 

 prices. An employer who has bought his materials and 

 entered into wage contracts when prices are high, and is 

 compelled to sell his product when prices are low is at a 

 disadvantage. Professor Marshall considers**' that the best 

 simple scale for the iron trade would probably be " based 

 on the excess of the price of a ton of iron of a certain 

 quality over the sums of the prices of the coal and ironstone 

 used in making it " ; but, inasmuch as these latter prices 

 are subject to much the same influences as that of iron, he 

 says, " the plan of basing the scale on the price of iron 

 simply seems not to work badly." Money, he thinks, is a 

 bad measure in which to express such an arrangement ; the 

 government could, and ought to publish from time to time 

 " the money value of a unit of purchasing power," and 

 scales should be based on that unit. 



When the character of the basis has been settled, there 

 are of course numerous matters of technique to be adjusted. 

 How great a variation in price is to be held necessary to 

 warrant a corresponding variation in wages? How much 

 shall this variation in wages be, and shall it proceed accord- 

 ing to a uniform succession or according to a principle of 

 graduation? How often shall prices be ascertained, and 

 wages revised? In general, it may be said that these ques- 

 tions can hardly be answered on any definite set of princi- 

 ples, but they must be answered by an appeal to the prin- 

 ciples of stability of wages, and equality in bargaining 

 power. 



It has been pointed out by Professor Ashley*" and others 



**Ibid., Preface, pp. xx, xxi. 



*3 Ashley, pp. 56-57; Chapman, pp. 186-196. 



