548 TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F, 
will be reversed. Return to conditions prevailing in early seventies. Danger 
of this position. Awkward position of wages. High prices mark scarcity, not 
plenty. Scarcity and high wages are incompatible. Ameliorating factors. 
High prices and high wages in a protected country are not the same thing as in a 
free-trading country. They are caused artificially in one, naturally in the 
other. Difficulty of existing circumstances. Difficulties of manufacturers. 
Manufacturing is one of the least remunerative of all occupations requiring 
outlay of capital. Contrast with other occupations. Reasons of poor average 
remuneration. Increasing burdens piled on this unremunerative occupation. 
Effect on wages; wages are growing less elastic. Questions of minimum and 
inaximum wage; both impracticable. Some causes affecting various wages. 
Benefits of labour organisations to labour doubtful. Benefit to labour organiser 
not doubtful; labour organisation is a new outlet to ambition. At whose ex- 
pense? Co-operation in manufacturing; margin of profit too small. Reluctance 
of labour to face losses. 
(ili) The Minimum Wage. By J. Ramsay Macponatp, M.P. 
(iv) Copartnership in Industry. By C. R. Fay, M.A. 
Profit-sharing is still a very rare thing in the aggregate of all business. Full 
details of existing schemes in the United Kingdom will be contained in the forth- 
coming Report by the Board of Trade. Profit-sharing is distinguished from 
gain-sharing by the fact that the latter is a premium on efficiency, payable 
irrespective of the general financial results of the year. But it is less easy to 
distinguish profit-sharing from copartnership. Two types of schemes are 
examined which claim this distinctive title :— 
I. The Copartnership Trust in Lever Brothers, Limited, soap-makers, of Port 
Sunlight, Cheshire, instituted in 1909.—The main features of the scheme are as 
follows: Partnership certificates are issued to qualified workers who sign the 
copartnership agreement. These certificates entitle the holders to share in 
profits over 5 per cent. part passu with the holders of the ordinary shares, and 
the dividends, which are paid into savings-bank account to individual copartners, 
are freely withdrawable. The certificates have no market value, and the scale 
of annual issue (at present 10 per cent. on salaries and wages) is determined by 
the majority shareholder. The allocation of certificates is left to trustees (the 
directors), assisted by an advisory committee of workers. On retirement, part- 
nership certificates are exchanged on certain terms for preferential certificates 
limited to 5 per cent. interest, which lapse at death. Workers who voluntarily 
leave the business or break their copartnership agreement forfeit all rights in 
the scrip. In considering the possibility of imitation, regard must be had to 
the following points :— 
(1) That the firm is an exceptionally successful one: (2) that it is the 
maker of a proprietary article; (3) that it has previously conferred other 
benefits on its employees. Figures for 1911: Certificates issued and outstand- 
ing—A. Partnership, 275,429/7.; B. preferential, 23,3027. (nominal value) ; divi- 
dend on A., at 10 per cent., 27,543/.; on B., at 5 per cent., 1,165/. 
II. Copartnership in the Gas Industry, with special reference to the South 
Metropolitan Company.—Copartnership began here in 1839, but since 1907 there 
has been rapid expansion, so that there are now thirty-six companies practising 
profit-sharing or copartnership; total capital, 50,000,000/7.; total of employees 
affected, 22,000. The financial side of the South Metropolitan scheme is based 
on a sliding-scale. For every 1d. reduction in the price of gas shareholders get 
a further 2s. 8d. per cent. of dividend, and copartners a bonus of $ per cent. 
Officers and workers are included in the scheme. ‘The present bonus is 84 per 
cent., and the stock held by employees over 300,000/. The bonus, which is the 
absolute property of the copartner, is not paid in cash but reserved, half for 
savings-account, withdrawable in special circumstances, and half for invest- 
ment in the company’s stock. Similar provisions appear in the schemes of other 
gas companies, with minor modifications. 
‘The advantages of the scheme are: (1) the addition to wages, (2) the pro- 
