Women in Modern Industry Part 10

Nor must it be forgotten that in modern industry women have a further advantage in being paid their own wages instead of being merely remunerated collectively in the family, as was often the case formerly.

Modern industry thus holds for the woman-worker the possibility of a more dignified and self-respecting position than the domestic system of the near past.

3. _The Possibilities of State Control._--We next note that _the industrial revolution has led to State control_, and that the Factory Act, whatever its defects in detail and its inadequacy to meet the situation, has greatly improved the status of the woman-worker by giving her _statutory rights against the employer_. This aspect has often been overlooked by leaders of the women's rights movement, who at one time tended to regard factory legislation as putting the woman in a childish and undignified position. But the true inwardness of the Factory Act is the a.s.sertion that workers are _persons_, with rights and needs that are sufficiently important to override commercial requirements. It has not only aided the progress of industrial betterment, but it has taught women that they are of significance and importance to the State, and has brought them out of the position of mere servility. A great deal more may be effected in the future when the governing cla.s.s attain to more enlightened views of civics and economics, and when the women themselves become politically and socially conscious of what they want.

4. _a.s.sociation. The factory system has also made it possible for women to strengthen their position by a.s.sociation and combination._--Such a.s.sociation affords women the best opportunity they have ever yet had of attaining economic independence on honourable conditions. And it is interesting to note that just as women are now awakening to social consciousness, and beginning to feel themselves members of a larger whole, so the Trade Unions are now reaching out to issues broader than the mere economic struggle, and are beginning to give more attention to social care for life and health. In the past the Unions have very largely taken what might be termed a juristic view of their functions. They have been concerned mainly with wage-questions, with the prevention of fraud through "truck," oppressive fines and unfair deductions; they have penalised backwardness in the improvement of machinery. As the management of a cotton mill concentrates on extorting the last unit of effort from the workers, so the Unions in the past have very largely concentrated on securing that the workers at any rate got their share of the results. But in more recent years the Unions are beginning to see that this, though good, is not enough. Industrial efficiency may be too dearly bought if it involves a loss of health, character, or personality, and recent reports of the cotton Unions show that the officials are increasingly aware of the seriousness of this matter from the point of view of health. _E.g._, the heavy rate of sickness among women-workers disclosed by the working of the Insurance Act has turned the attention of the Weavers' Amalgamation towards the insanitary conditions in which even now so many operatives do their work. "Fresh air, which is such an essential to health, is a bad thing for the cotton industry; what is wanted is damp air, and calico is more important than men and women. When they are not well they can come on the Insurance Act. We want to talk less about malingering and more about insanitary conditions, which is the real cause of excessive claims."[51]

Just as the woman's movement is widening its vision to understand the needs of labour, so the Unions now are widening theirs to understand the claims of life and health. The officials are already alive, if unfortunately the Lancas.h.i.+re parents are not, to the evils of the half-time system. And the co-operation of women in the active work of the Union will strengthen this conviction.

_The Future Organisation of Women._--As women come more and more into conscious citizens.h.i.+p they will, as Professor Pearson prophesied twenty years ago, demand a more comprehensive policy of social welfare. We may expect in the future that the care of adolescence and the care of maternity will be considered more closely than it ever has been; also that such social provision for maternity as may be made will be linked up with the working life of women, so that marriage shall not be penalised by requiring women against their will to leave work when they marry, and on the other hand, that the home-loving woman of domestic tastes shall not be forced, as now so often happens, to leave her children and painfully earn their bread outside her home.

One of the great obstacles in the way of attaining such measures of reform has been, not only the comparative lack of organisation of women-workers but the difficulty of adapting existing organisations, devised for the trade purposes of the workers at a single industrial process, to these broader social purposes. The majority, as we have seen, in Chapter III., leave work on marriage, and the problem results, how to bridge the "cleft"[52] in the woman's career and give her an abiding interest in organisation. How, the old-fas.h.i.+oned craft organiser asks with a mild despair, how is he to organise reckless young people for whom work is a meanwhile employment, who go and get married and upset all his calculations? How are women, whose work is temporary, to be given a permanent interest in their a.s.sociation? For some women, no doubt, their work _is_ a life-work, but it is most unlikely it will ever be so for the majority. Mr. Wells's idea, shared with the late William James, of a kind of conscription of the young people to do socially necessary work for a few short years has a curious applicability to women. There are certain distinct stages in a woman's life which the exigencies of the present commercial society fit very badly. One can foresee a society arranged to do more justice to human needs and apt.i.tudes in which girls might enter certain employments as a transition stage in their careers; then marry and adopt home-making and child-tending as their occupation for a period; then, when domestic claims slackened off in urgency, devote their experience and knowledge of life to administrative work, social, educational, or for public health. Other women with a strong leaning to a special skilled occupation might prefer to carry it on continuously.

Different types of organisation will be needed for different types of work. If the craft Union cannot fit all types of male workers, much less can it fit all women. Trade Unionism as we have known it mostly presupposed a permanent craft or occupation, and one of the great troubles of Trade Unions for women is that so many women do not aspire to a permanent occupation. The "clearing-house" type of Union suggested by Mr.

Cole to accommodate workers who follow an occupation now in one industry, now in another, might possibly be adapted to meet the needs of women.

Perhaps a time will come when the Unions that include the "woman-worker"

will be linked up with societies like the Women's Labour League or the Women's Co-operative Guild, whose members.h.i.+p consists mainly of "working women," that is to say of women of the industrial cla.s.ses who are not themselves earners.

These speculations may seem to run ahead of the industrial world we now know. But all around us the Trade Unions are federating into larger and larger bodies, and when these great organisations have attained to that central control and direction they have been feeling after for generations, they will certainly discover that it is essential for them to develop a considerable degree of interdependence between the Trade Unions and consumers' co-operation. Therewith they can hardly fail to grasp the latent possibilities of the members.h.i.+p of women. The woman is much less an earner, much more a consumer and spender than is the man; she is more interested in life than in work, in wealth for use than in wealth for power. She suffers as a consumer and a spender both when prices go up and when wages go down. It is difficult to believe that the working cla.s.ses will not before long develop some effective organisation to protect themselves against the exploitation that is accountable, in part at least, for both processes. Mrs. Billington Greig's masterly study of the exploitation of the unorganised consumer is a demonstration of the need of awakening some collective conscience in a specially inert and inarticulate cla.s.s, and Miss Margaretta Hicks is making most valuable experiments in the practical work of organising women as consumers. The supposed apathy and lack of public spirit in women has been largely due to the lack of any visible organic connection between their industrial life as earners and their domestic life as spenders and home-makers. Probably the future of the organisation of women will depend on the degree in which this connexion can be made vital and effective.

PART II

CHAPTER VI.

WOMEN'S WAGES IN THE WAGE CENSUS OF 1906.

BY J. J. MALLON.

Until a few years ago no statistics comprehensive in character relating to women's wages were available. In 1906, however, the Board of Trade took "census" of the wages and hours of labour of the persons employed in all the industries of the country, and the result has been a series of volumes which, though becoming rapidly out-of-date, nevertheless throw much light on the general level of wages in various trades and occupations.

The enquiry made by the Board of Trade was a voluntary enquiry: that is to say, it was left to the public spirit and general amiability of the employer to make a return or not as he pleased. There was no penalty for failure to furnish information. The response to the Board of Trade efforts was not, however, unsatisfactory, and returns were forthcoming, roughly speaking, in respect of nearly half the wage-earners employed in the different industries. Unfortunately, however, the fact that the authorities were dependent for their information on the goodwill of the employers has probably given the statistics a certain bias. The schedules supplied were somewhat forbidding in appearance, and often troublesome to fill in, and it may fairly be surmised that it was the good rather than the bad employers who put themselves to the trouble of complying with the official request. Hence of all the workers employed in the United Kingdom it was probably those who were more fortunately placed in regard to whom we now have statistics. The condition of those working for employers who thought that the less said about their wages-sheets the better, still remains obscure. The statistics upon which comments are now offered may therefore convey a more favourable impression than the facts, if fully known, would justify, especially when it is remembered that 1906, the year of the census, was one of good trade. On the other hand, it needs to be borne in mind that since the enquiry was made, the level of wages in many trades is known to have been raised.

The Earnings and Hours of Labour Enquiry, as it was officially called, was directed primarily to ascertaining for each of the princ.i.p.al occupations in the various trades what were _the usual earnings or wages of a worker employed for full time in an ordinary week_, the last pay week in September being the particular week suggested subject to the employer's view as to its normality.

With a view to supplementing or checking the details of actual earnings in a particular week, information was also sought with respect to the _total_ wages paid in an ordinary pay week in each month, and also with respect to the total wages paid in the year. From this last-mentioned body of information it is possible to deduce some tentative conclusions in regard to the extent to which the industry suffers from seasonal variations.

This matter will be further considered below. It is, however, mainly the information in regard to full-time earnings in an ordinary week with which it is proposed to deal. Statistics, it may safely be a.s.sumed, are abhorred of the general reader; but they are the alphabet of social study and cannot be dispensed with, and certain tables must now be introduced showing the relative wage level for women in a number of important industries. It should be noted that the abstract "woman" who is dealt with in the statistics is a female person of eighteen years of age or over. She may be, though is not likely to be, a new recruit or learner. She may, on the other hand, be very old and infirm, though here again the probabilities are against it. In all cases, however, she works full time, which roughly we may regard as being about fifty to fifty-two hours a week.

The following table shows the average weekly full-time earnings of women employed in the princ.i.p.al textile industries. In addition to the average, which may of course be a compound of a great many widely differing conditions, the proportion or percentage of women whose earnings fall within certain limits is also shown.[53]

TABLE A

+-----------------------------------------------------+ | | Percentage numbers of | | | | women working full time | | | | in the last pay-week of | | | | September 1906, whose | | | | earnings fell within the| | | Industry. | undermentioned limits. | Average | | |-------------------------|earnings for| | |Under| 10s. and |15s. and| full time. | | | 10s.|under 15s.| over. | | |--------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| | | | | | s. d. | |All textiles | 133| 388 | 479 | 15 5 | |--------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |Cotton | 30| 209 | 761 | 18 8 | |Hosiery | 145| 444 | 411 | 14 3 | |Wool, worsted | 107| 556 | 337 | 13 10 | |Lace | 181| 493 | 326 | 13 5 | |Jute | 62| 664 | 274 | 13 5 | |Silk | 389| 478 | 133 | 11 2 | |Linen | 417| 491 | 92 | 10 9 | +-----------------------------------------------------+

The cotton industry stands out conspicuously as showing a relatively high level of earnings, and we find in marked contrast to the other trades in this group that only 3 per cent of the women earned less than 10s. a week.

The results coincide of course with popular impression, it being well known that the mill la.s.ses of Lancas.h.i.+re are the best paid--probably because the best organised--large group of women workers in the country.

The woollen and worsted industry, like the cotton, is localised, being confined mainly to Yorks.h.i.+re, though the woollen industry of the lowlands of Scotland is also important. In this trade the results are much less satisfactory, the average being 13s. 10d., and considerably more than half the total number employed earning less than 15s. It may be noted, however, that in one town, Huddersfield, where women and men are engaged largely on the same work, the average, 17s. 1d., is considerably higher than that for the United Kingdom.

Hosiery is also strongly localised, the majority of the workpeople being employed in Leicesters.h.i.+re, Nottinghams.h.i.+re, and certain neighbouring parts of Derbys.h.i.+re. It will be seen that in order of average earnings this industry stands next to, though a good distance from, cotton, the average being 14s. 3d. The best-paid centre is Leicester itself, where the average is 16s. 2d. Even in this relatively highly paid trade, however, more than half of the women earned less than 15s., and it should be noted that this result applies to factory workers only. In the hosiery trade a considerable amount of homework is also carried on, and though statistics are not at present available, it may safely be a.s.sumed that earnings in the homework section of the trade are less than in the factory section.

At the bottom of the list is the linen industry. The average here is only 10s. 9d.; less than one-tenth of the women employed earned more than 15s., while between one-third and one-half earned less than 10s. The industry, as is well known, is centred mainly in the North of Ireland, but is also carried on to a considerable extent in Scotland and to a small extent in England. The figures for Ireland, however, are not markedly lower than those for the other districts. It is true that for the whole of Ireland outside Belfast the average is only 9s. 9d., but the figure for Belfast itself, namely 10s. 10d., coincides with that for England.

The manufacture of jute is carried on almost entirely in the neighbourhood of Dundee. The average is therefore a local average.

The other industries require no special comment.

The second large group of trades, important from the point of view of women's employment, is the clothing industry. Although the averages in this group do not show the extremes of the textile group, the industry is nevertheless one in which a great variety of skill and remuneration prevails. The following are the statistics, certain of the smaller trades such as silk and felt hat-making and leather glove-making being omitted for the sake of brevity:--

TABLE B

+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | Percentage numbers of | | | | women working full time | | | | in the last pay-week of | | | | September 1906, whose | | | | earnings fell within the| | | Industry. | undermentioned limits. | Average | | |-------------------------|earnings for| | |Under| 10s. and |15s. and| full time. | | | 10s.|under 15s.| over. | | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| | | | | | s. d. | | All clothing | 216| 451 | 333 | 13 6 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |Dress, millinery, etc. | | | | | | (factory). | 126| 395 | 479 | 15 5 | |Tailoring (bespoke) | 154| 424 | 422 | 14 2 | |Dress, millinery, etc. | | | | | | (workshop) | 280| 362 | 358 | 13 10 | |s.h.i.+rt, blouse, | | | | | | underclothing, etc. | 222| 460 | 318 | 13 4 | |Boot and shoe (ready-made) | 124| 589 | 287 | 13 1 | |Tailoring (ready-made) | 240| 466 | 294 | 12 11 | |Laundry (factory) | 205| 520 | 275 | 12 10 | |Corsets (factory) | 288| 483 | 229 | 12 2 | +-------------------------------------------------------------------+

It will be seen that the dress, millinery and mantle-making group is divided into two according to whether the place of manufacture is a workshop or factory. For this purpose a workshop means a place where mechanical power is not used, and a factory a place where such power is used. The distinction also roughly corresponds to the difference between ordered or bespoke and ready-made garments, ordered garments being made princ.i.p.ally in workshops, and ready-made garments princ.i.p.ally though not so exclusively in factories. This being the case it may perhaps be surprising that the average for the workshop section, namely 13s. 10d., is so appreciably below that for the factory section, namely 15s. 5d., and the statistics in this respect serve to indicate that the introduction of mechanical power and other labour-saving devices into industry by no means implies that from the point of view of wages the workers employed will be any worse off.

The workshop section of the dress, etc., trade is almost entirely a woman's trade, the number of men and boys being insignificant. Within the trade itself a considerable range of earnings exists. Fitters and cutters form the aristocracy of the profession, but one which is recruited from the humbler ranks. The average earnings for the United Kingdom of those who "lived out" amounted to 33s. 5d., and of those who "lived in" 27s. 9d.

The practice of "living in" and being provided with full board and lodging, or at any rate being provided with partial board, is a feature of this section of the trade, some 2500 women and girls out of 40,000 included in the returns being noted as receiving payment in kind in addition to their cash wages.

Another feature of the trade is the relatively large number of apprentices or learners who received no wages at all, 87 per cent of the women and girls in the dressmaking trade, 43 per cent of the milliners, and 17 per cent of the mantle-makers being so returned. These, of course, would be mostly under eighteen years of age, and their inclusion in the statistics would not affect the average given in the table for women. Considering the general level of earnings which the statistics disclose, one can only conjecture that, as in certain men's professions, the existence of a few well-paid posts exercises an attraction to enter the trade, the strength of which is out of all proportion to the chance of obtaining one of these prizes.

Factory dressmaking is at present a relatively small but at the same time rapidly-growing group. Being confined mainly to the production of ready-made clothes the process of cutting is capable of being standardised and systematised in such a way that the degree of skill required is much less than that looked for in the highly-paid cutter and fitter of the "made-to-order" workshop. The other processes also tend to conform to a certain uniform standard of skill. Hence the range of earnings is much less wide than in the workshop section of the trade, though as before noted the general level is higher. It should also be observed that while time-work is the usual method adopted in the workshops, payment by piece is very common in factories, and the detailed statistics furnished in the official report make it clear that this method gives the diligent and rapid worker a distinct advantage. It is worth noting that the group showing the highest earnings is that of hand or foot machinists on piece work. In the dress and costume section the average was 16s. 2d., and in the mantle section 17s. 8d., as compared with 15s. 5d. for all women.

Statistics also indicate that the fluctuations of employment are much less extreme in the factory than in the workshop section of the trade, and on the whole, therefore, it is probably not a matter for regret that the factory-made article is tending to displace that of the workshop. That the process of displacement is rapid is indicated by the fact that while, according to returns made in connection with the Factory and Workshop Acts, the employment of women in dress, millinery and mantle-making factories increased by 16 per cent between 1904 and 1907, the numbers employed in workshops diminished by 7 per cent. The change from the one system to the other does not always imply a change of workers or even of premises. The introduction of an electric motor to drive some of the sewing-machines is sufficient to alter the denomination of an establishment from workshop to factory; though at the same time it is probable that such an innovation would not take place unless some alteration in the general method or organisation of work were also contemplated.

The tailoring trade has many points of contact with the dress and mantle-making trade which has just been reviewed. It too is divided with some sharpness into a made-to-order or bespoke, and a ready-made section.

The distinction does not imply perhaps quite so clear a division between factories and workshops, though in this trade also it may be taken as broadly true that the bespoke is the workshop and the ready-made is the factory section. In this connection one interesting point of contrast is presented by the statistics, for it will be seen that while, as before noted, the factory section of the dress and mantle-making trade showed a higher general level of earnings than the workshop section, the reverse is true of the tailoring trade. This is probably due princ.i.p.ally to two facts. The first is that while the work in the bespoke shop is usually skilled, it does not necessitate any exceptionally well-paid work such as that done by cutters and trimmers in the dressmaking establishment. The cutting and other highly-skilled work is done by men, so that women enter the trade without the inducement afforded by the chance, however small, of rising to 35s., 2, or even 3 a week which is offered by the dressmaking workshop. It is probable, moreover, that the small dress and mantle-making shop enjoys a certain reputation of "gentility" which is less marked in the tailoring establishment, and finds its equivalent in higher wages. The second fact is that the processes of simplification and subdivision which broadly are the characteristics of factory as distinct from workshop methods can be carried further in the manufacture of men's suits than in that of ladies' dresses and costumes, so that the general level of skill requisite to the factory worker is somewhat lower in the one case than in the other. We thus find that while the average in tailoring workshops is 14s. 2d. as compared with 13s. 10d. in dressmaking shops, the average in tailoring factories is 12s. 11d. as compared with 15s. 5d. in dressmaking factories.

Since the statistics were compiled minimum rates have been fixed under the Trade Boards Act to apply to the ready-made and wholesale bespoke sections of the tailoring trade, and there is no doubt that with the minimum rate of 3-1/4d.[54] an hour, fixed for Great Britain, statistics relating to the present time would show a marked improvement on those relating to 1906, since a _minimum_ rate of 3-1/4d. probably implies in most cases an average rate of 3-1/2d. or even 3-3/4d. Moreover, on the testimony of employers themselves the introduction of a minimum rate has had a stimulating effect on the trade, bringing about on the part of employers a vigilance and alacrity to make improvements in organisation, which have had an effect on the efficiency of the workers and consequently on their earnings, so that in many cases the Trade Board minimum has become merely a historical landmark left behind on a road of steady progress.

So far as the 1906 figures are concerned it will be seen that the average for the United Kingdom in the bespoke section was 14s. 2d. The detailed statistics show that London was the highest-paid district, with 16s. 2d., and Ireland the lowest, with 12s.

As ladies' costume-making has points of contact with men's tailoring, so the tailoring trade merges almost imperceptibly through various gradations of linen and cotton jackets, overalls, etc., into the s.h.i.+rt-making trade, and this again is closely combined, and, indeed, for statistical purposes forms one group with the manufacture of blouses and underclothing.

The s.h.i.+rt, blouse and underclothing trade has become a factory trade to a much more marked extent than either dressmaking or tailoring. By tradition s.h.i.+rt-making is the sweated trade _par excellence_. But, as in many other instances, tradition has outlived the fact, the statistics showing that while the average earnings, 13s. 4d., are low absolutely, the trade is nearer the top than the bottom of the clothing trade list, notwithstanding the fact that the manufacture of s.h.i.+rts is combined for the purpose of the statistics with that of articles, such as baby linen, in respect of which the wages are almost certainly much lower than those for men's s.h.i.+rts. It should be noted, however, that the wages of home-workers are nowhere included in the statistics.

The boot and shoe trade, unlike most of the others in the clothing group, is mainly a man's trade, considerably more than half of the total number employed being males. Women are employed chiefly as machinists or upper closers, or as fitters in both cases, being concerned with the manufacture of the top or upper. The trade is carried on in many centres, the princ.i.p.al being, perhaps, Leicester, Northampton, Kettering, Bristol, Norwich, Leeds, and Glasgow. The highest earnings of women are recorded for Manchester, the average being 17s. 6d., and the lowest for Norwich, where the average is only 10s. 6d. It is worth noting that the high average for women in Manchester is combined with a relatively low average for men, namely, 27s. 8d.

The laundry trade gives employment to a large number of women, the Factory Returns for 1907 showing that 61,802 were employed in laundries using mechanical power, and 26,012 in laundries where such power was not used.

For the whole of the United Kingdom the averages for power and for hand laundries were practically the same, being 12s. 10d. in the one case and 12s. 9d. in the other. In the case of power laundries Ireland is at the bottom of the list with an average of 10s. 4d., and the best-paid districts, namely, London, show an average of only 13s. 6d. A recent attempt to bring the power laundry industry within the scope of the Trade Boards Act has failed, the employers opposing the Provisional Order mainly on the ground of certain alleged technical defects of definition.

Of other trades in which women are largely employed the following selection may be made forming a somewhat miscellaneous group.

TABLE C

+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | Percentage number of | | | | women working full time | | | | whose earnings in the | | | | last pay-week of | | | Industries. | September 1906 fell | | | | within the | | | | undermentioned limits. | Average | | |-------------------------|earnings for| | |Under| 10s. and |15s. and| full time. | | | 10s.|under 15s.| over. | | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |All paper, printing, etc., | | | | s. d. | | trades | 265| 522 | 213 | 12 2 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |Bookbinding | 193| 554 | 253 | 12 10 | |Printing | 280| 492 | 228 | 12 3 | |Cardboard, canvas, etc., | | | | | | box manufacture | 247| 551 | 202 | 12 3 | |Paper stationery manufacture| 304| 495 | 201 | 11 11 | |Paper manufacture | 259| 558 | 183 | 11 11 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |All pottery, brick, gla.s.s, | | | | | | and chemical | 310| 497 | 193 | 11 10 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |Explosives | 323| 350 | 327 | 13 1 | |Soap and candle | 243| 505 | 252 | 12 5 | |Porcelain, china, and | | | | | | earthenware | 290| 500 | 210 | 11 11 | |Brick, tile, pipe, etc. | 257| 644 | 99 | 11 5 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |All food, drink, and tobacco| 378| 442 | 180 | 11 5 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |Tobacco, cigar, cigarette, | | | | | | and snuff | 311| 460 | 229 | 12 0 | |Cocoa, chocolate, and sugar | | | | | | confectionery | 405| 372 | 223 | 11 9 | |Preserved food, jam, pickle,| | | | | | sauce, etc. | 444| 430 | 126 | 10 11 | |Biscuit making | 336| 535 | 129 | 10 10 | |Aerated water, etc., | | | | | | manufacture and general | | | | | | bottling | 548| 427 | 25 | 9 7 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |Miscellaneous | .. | .. | .. | 12 4 | |----------------------------|-----|----------|--------|------------| |Umbrella, parasol, and | | | | | | stick making | 101| 385 | 514 | 15 7 | |Portmanteau, bag, purse, and| | | | | | miscellaneous leather | | | | | | manufacture | 203| 563 | 234 | 12 8 | |India-rubber, gutta-percha, | | | | | | etc. | 147| 683 | 170 | 12 8 | |Saddlery, harness, and whip | | | | | | manufacture | 375| 557 | 68 | 10 7 | |Brush and broom | 470| 425 | 105 | 10 6 | +-------------------------------------------------------------------+