548 TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F. 
bring in special considerations, must be ruled off from the subject matter 
of this address. 
There is no doubt but that all advanced industrialism to-day is feeling 
the strain of ap accumulation of forces tending to bring about an abbrevia- 
tion of the working day, and that it will be subjected to the same strain 
in the future. Now, in relation to this experience, it is disturbing to notice 
that a close-set limit is imposed upon reduction of hours by the heavy 
interest and depreciation charges with which the product of a machine 
is burdened when it works only a fraction of the time for which interest 
must be paid. As regards depreciation it must be observed that buildings 
deteriorate in value at least as much when shut up as when they are 
occupied ; that machinery continues to wear out, and sometimes rapidly, 
when it is idle; and that the reserve fund necessary because the market 
may contract at any time, and because machinery may at any time be 
rendered obsolete, is independent of the length of the working day. Many 
inventions involve an extended use of capital per head, though all do 
not, and interest and depreciation charges are on the one hand interdicting 
the application of some of those new ideas to industry which do necessitate 
heavier capital investment, and on the other hand preventing those applied 
from reducing hours so much as they otherwise would. 
The weight of the discouragement indicated above to the shortening 
of the hours of labour depends, of course, upon the relation between wages 
and payments for capital in the expenses of a business, and this relation 
varies with the industry. A rough calculation, nevertheless, for a 
particular industry of the saving in hours which might be effected by the 
continuous running of plant will not be altogether irrelevant. 
In the industry for which I have obtained figures, interest and deprecia- 
tion would be reckoned ordinarily at 10 per cent. on the capital, about 
half for each, while wages would be in the neighbourhood of 12} per 
cent. Now, it is being assumed provisionally that the depreciation charge 
varies as the hours worked, that the rate of interest is a constant, that 
the equipment of the industry remains as before and labour tends neither 
to leave the industry nor to flood into it, and that other costs of production 
are not affected, we find that hours could be reduced from ten to eight 
without any loss of wages, were the continuous running of plant substituted 
for the ten hours day.’ 
1 The calculation is as follows :— 
Interest = 5 per cent. of capital. 
Depreciation = 45 . i 
Wages. : = 12} . Ay 
.. Wages + Interest = 174 3 sy 
Continuous running would mean increasing the annual duration of production in 
the ratio of = Hence, with continuous running, 
2 
Wages + Interest = 173 x = = 42 per cent. of capital. 
And, as the capital remains as before— 
Interest : 
Wages 
5 ‘per cent. of capital. 
37 ” ” 
Wt 
Writing 2 for the daily hours worked per head which would yield the same 
weekly wages as before, we have 
37 _ 123 
oA t= 0" ule 
_ 300 
ee ay = 8 (approximately). 
