Chapter X: Unemployment and Insurance. 90

The greatest problem in modern industry as well as the greatest curse to the laboring classes, is unemployment. While unemployment has always existed under all systems of labor, it assumed added significance when the introduction of the wage system threw every worker upon his own resources and made him responsible for the care of himself and his family. Modern industry is sensitive and unstable and its delicate mechanism, very likely to get out of order; credit and fashion, to mention no others, are factors that make for instability, and these are essentially modern. Professor Marshall is of the opinion that the factory system has not increased inconstancy of employment, but has simply rendered it plainer by localizing it. But whether more or fewer than in earlier times, the number of the unemployed in modern industry is appallingly great. It is not easy to estimate correctly the extent and amount of this evil and we accordingly find considerable variations in the statistical presentations of fact. In 1885 two investigations of the amount of employment were made, one by Carroll D. Wright, in his report as United States Commissioner of Labor for 1886, and the other by the Massachusetts Bureau of Labor in its report for 1887. Mr. Wright defines the unemployed very narrowly as “those who under prosperous times would be fully employed, and who, during the time mentioned, were seeking employment”; using the term in this restricted sense he concluded that 7½ per cent of the working population engaged in manufacturing and mechanical pursuits, and trade and transportation were idle during the year, which moreover he considered one of extreme depression. The Massachusetts statistics, on the other hand, were presented as indicative of general conditions in normal years and may safely be regarded as such. According to this report, 30 per cent of the total number of breadwinners in the state had been unemployed at 91 their principal occupations on an average of 4.11 months in the year covered; some of these found work at other or secondary occupations. But the net result of the investigation was well put in the terse statement of the report, that “about one-third of the total persons engaged in remunerative labor were unemployed at their principal occupation for about one-third of the working time.” At the lowest estimate the whole working population lost on the average almost one-tenth of their working time. The loss of such a proportion of the community’s productive force, with all the demoralization attendant upon irregular or no labor, is evidence of a problem of grave import.

Unemployment is such a broad term and covers so many different ideas that it will be well to classify the unemployed before proceeding further. They may be logically divided into the following classes: I. The temporarily unemployed, who comprise (a) those certain of work again, as efficient workmen who are temporarily out of work owing to seasonal variations, shut downs, etc.; (b) those without such prospect, a group which again divides into two groups, namely, (1) efficient and industrious workmen who have been thrown out of work by a change in fashion, the introduction of new machinery, foreign competition, a prolonged depression, etc., and (2) those whose work is essentially fluctuating and casual in its nature, as casual day laborers, charwomen, etc. II. The permanently unemployed, consisting in turn of (a) the “won’t-works,” as tramps, and (b) the “can’t-works,” or the defective and dependent classes generally. Such a classification renders much easier the analysis both of the causes and of the cure of unemployment.

The first question that presents itself in any discussion of the causes of unemployment is whether it is due primarily to personal causes, as inefficiency or intemperance, or to industrial causes over which the individual has no control. “Personal causes are those 92 mental, moral, and physical defects which show themselves either in the inability and inefficiency of the workman or in his unwillingness to work. Here are included all the varieties of personal inaptitude, ranging from idiocy, intemperance, and vice to old age, sickness, and accident.”[25] Such a comprehensive definition includes many cases, of course, where no blame can be attached to the individual, and yet each one of these causes is personal, that is, it does not affect at the same time a whole group, as an industrial depression would do. Persons included in this group are always on the margin of employment; in bad times the first to be discharged, in good times they are the last to be employed. Nor is the cause of their lack of employment always easy to give; it may be itself the result of industrial accident or unhealthful occupation, or the result of heredity, evil habits and associations, and defective education. We may present two tables giving briefly the causes of poverty and unemployment. The first gives the causes of poverty ascribed by the charity organization societies of New York, Boston, and Baltimore to applicants for relief:

Causes of poverty: charity organization society records.[A]

=================================+===================
Cause. | Per cent.
---------------------------------+---------+---------
Drink | 13.7 |
Shiftlessness and inefficiency | 7.5 |
Other moral defects | 2.1 |
Total, Character | | 23.3
---------------------------------+---------+---------
No male support | 5.0 |
Lack of other normal support | 3.6 |
Total, Support | | 8.6
---------------------------------+---------+--------
Lack of employment | 23.5 |
Insufficient employment | 8.1 |
Poorly paid, etc. | 3.3 |
Total, Employment | | 34.9
---------------------------------+---------+--------
Sickness and death in family | 21.1 | 93
Insanity and physical defects | 4.1 |
Old Age | 3.9 |
Other incapacity | 3.2 |
Total, Incapacity | | 32.3
---------------------------------+---------+--------
| 100. | 100.
---------------------------------+---------+--------

[A] Warner, American Charities, Rev. Ed., 53.

The first group of causes indicates misconduct, as the last group indicates misfortune; the other two shade off into industrial causes, though lack of employment--the largest single cause--may in turn be ascribed to any one of several remoter causes according to the bias of the investigator. This table is a record of the causes of failure on the part of those who have fallen behind or dropped out altogether in the race of life. At the other end of the scale stand the members of labor organization, on the whole, the elite of the labor world. The following table gives the causes of unemployment of 31,339 cases at the end of September, 1900, as reported to the New York Bureau of Labor Statistics:

Causes of idleness, members of trade unions, 1900.

---------------------+-----------
Cause | Per Cent
---------------------+-----------
No work | 75.5
Bad weather | .5
Strike or lockout | 13.0
Sickness | 4.7
Superannuation | 1.6
Other causes | 4.7
|
Total | 100.0
---------------------+----------

This table emphasizes very strongly the industrial causes of unemployment, three-fourths of which is ascribed to lack of work. In some cases, as the iron and steel workers, where there is a regular 94 two months’ shut-down to make repairs, and the building trades where the inclemency of the weather usually prevents work during the winter, the lack of employment may be regarded as a vacation rather than a hardship, for the rates of pay are high enough during the remaining months to offset those of idleness. In other cases, however, as in coal-mining, there is a large reserve army of workers on hand and employment is secured for only one-half to two-thirds the time. In 1900, when the average number of days of employment was larger than it had been in ten years, the bituminous miners were employed only 234 days and the anthracite miners only 166 days in the year. This indicates a very bad organization of the industry. The same thing was formerly true of the London dockyards, where there was a reserve army of some 4,000 surplus workers. Of course the effect of this is to depress wages. The clothing trade is subject to seasonal fluctuations and the caprice of fashion, and offers very irregular employment. Machinery and improved processes were frequently spoken of by witnesses before the Industrial Commission as the leading cause of unemployment. If the general conditions of business are good at the time of the first introduction of machinery the displaced laborer is reabsorbed again and the hardship is not so noticeable. But if it coincides with a period of business depression the introduction of machinery appears to be the cause of a large displacement of labor, which might more truly be ascribed to industrial depression. This last cause is responsible for enormous suffering among the laboring classes, for the method oftenest resorted to by industrial enterprises to reduce expenses is the wholesale discharge of laborers, who are thus made to bear the burden of industrial disorganization. This was well illustrated by the economies effected by the railroads in the year 1908, in their general reduction of the labor force and of wages. But even in good years the inconstancy of employment is startling. In 95 the four years 1897-1900 the men in trade unions in New York State lost 16.2 per cent of their time from unemployment, which is almost exactly one day in every week. And these, it must be remembered, were skilled and efficient workers in organized trades. Finally, strikes are given as a cause of unemployment in the table; these are a peculiar feature of modern industry, and do not call for further discussion, except to point out that they are not as important as often represented.

The foregoing analysis of the causes of unemployment shows that they are deep-seated in the nature of modern industry, and that it would be unjust to the workingman to attribute them in any large measure to his incapacity or indisposition to labor. The care of the unemployable must of course be undertaken by society, and such persons prevented as far as possible from depressing the wages of competent labor by their competition. Exceptional periods of distress may and should be met by temporary relief measures. But what we may call the normal unemployment in modern industry, which amounts to 2-2½ per cent of the labor force, cannot be overcome by direct methods. The remedy for this lies “in a better organization of employers and employes, more steady expansion of trade, and greater stability of industry and of legislation affecting industry. These are not problems directly of unemployment, but rather of taxation, currency, monopoly, immigration, over-production, and technical advances in industry. Their treatment must be undertaken, not primarily as measures of providing for the unemployed, but as measures for improving the conditions of business.”[26] The problem of unemployment would thus seem to be a permanent one, bound up in the very nature of a dynamic society; it may be regarded as the price of progress. But the question may fairly be raised as to whether the laboring classes should foot the bill, 96 or whether the cost might not fairly be borne by society as a whole. This has suggested, as a solution of the problem, insurance of workingmen against unemployment, a discussion of which, however, must be deferred to the end of the section. Some methods of alleviation, if not of abolition, of the evils of unemployment may be suggested. Free public employment bureaus and agencies, national in scope and well integrated, would do much to secure a better adjustment of demand and supply in the labor market, and secure a better distribution of the labor force and greater mobility of labor. Better organization and mutual understanding on the part of both employers and employes is needed, to prevent the loss through strikes and lockouts. And finally, improved industrial and technical education is essential, whereby the loss in skill through the introduction of new inventions and machinery may be minimized, and the productivity of the laboring class be increased.

Among the measures of relief for unemployment due to accident, sickness, and old age, none is more important or more deserving of a hearing in the United States than that of insurance against these evils. The earnings of the average male wage-earner are so small--half of the number earn annually less than $436, and half of the adult male factory workers earn less than $400 a year--that the unemployment, sickness, disablement, or old age of the breadwinner must throw a large proportion of families so afflicted into a condition of periodic poverty. Any remedies that will alleviate the miseries caused by fluctuations in employment, industrial accidents, diseases incident to industry, etc., deserve a respectful hearing.

No adequate statistics of industrial accidents exist in the United States, but a recent estimate by F. L. Hoffman[27] gave the number of fatal accidents among occupied males in 1908 as between 30,000 and 35,000. An analysis of the reports of the New York Bureau of Labor 97 Statistics from 1901 to 1906, shows that of the total number (39,244) of industrial accidents reported in that state a little over 2 per cent were fatal, almost 17 per cent resulted in permanent disablement, and 81 per cent resulted in temporary disablement. More than half of the accidents in industry are the result of machinery in motion. Mr. Hoffman calculates that “it should not be impossible to save at least one-third or perhaps one-half by intelligent and rational methods of factory inspection, legislation, and control.” Prevention of accidents rather than compensation to the workingman after they occur should be the aim of society, in order to avoid the wasteful loss of productive power, not to mention the suffering and misery entailed by such accidents. “Immunity, not compensation,” has been the demand of the British trade unions. Of first importance then is careful factory legislation, safeguarding of machinery, and factory inspection. But here we are interested primarily in the question of responsibility and compensation. In the United States, legislatures and the courts have taken the position that the workingman was responsible unless he could prove the employer responsible for his injury. How impossible such proof is and consequently how intenable such a position, is clear from the following table, compiled by the German Government for purposes of accident insurance:

Accidents in German industries traceable to different causes.

==============================+=============+==========+========
Causes. | Agriculture | Industry | Mining
| (1891) | (1887) | (1887)
------------------------------+-------------+----------+--------
Fault of employer | 18.2 | 19.8 | 1.3
Fault of injured workman | 24.4 | 25.0 | 29.8
Fault of both | 20.1 | 4.4 |
Fault of third person | 2.8 | 3.3 | 4.3
Unavoidable or indeterminable | 34.5 | 46.9 | 64.6
+-------------+----------+--------
Total | 100.0 | 100.0 | 100.0
------------------------------+-------------+----------+--------

Statistics from both Germany and Austria show that a full half or 98 more of all industrial accidents are due to causes for which neither employers, injured workmen, nor fellow employes are responsible, but which are incidental to the nature of the industry itself. But besides the danger of injury from machinery, there are numerous specially dangerous or injurious trades, in which injury by poisoning, disease, etc., is almost unavoidable as trade processes are at present conducted. These have been classified as follows: trades in which lead is a poisonous element, trades which produce other chemical poisons, trades in which lockjaw is an incident, trades in which the danger arises from injurious particles in the air, or from dust, processes that require a sudden change from heat to cold and vice versa, and those that require artificial humidity, and trades in which accidents are so frequent as to demand special legislation. Before we try to decide who in justice should bear the cost of sickness or injury arising from these causes, let us inquire as to the practice in the United States and in other countries, so as to have the data necessary for a fair conclusion.

The original legal doctrine regarding liability for accident in England and America, which is still practically unmodified in the latter country, was based on the principle of individual responsibility for acts of negligence. Briefly stated the common law doctrine is that an employer must provide reasonably safe conditions of employment, and that then the employe assumes the risks incident to the occupation, or arising from the carelessness of fellow-servants; moreover, even if the employer has been remiss, the employe cannot collect damages if he has been guilty of contributory negligence. These three doctrines--assumption of risk, doctrine of the fellow-servant, and contributory negligence--have been used practically to free the employer from all responsibility in cases where injured employes have sought to secure damages. Moreover, as has been shown above, many cases exist where it is impossible to fix 99 the blame on either employer, employe, or a third party, and in such cases no compensation could be secured for injury under the law. The full rigor of the common law, which has worked out so unfairly for the workingman in modern machine production, has been modified in about twenty-seven states by statutes defining more exactly the duties of the employer, and repealing the fellow-servant doctrine in regard to railway employes and in a few states in regard to all mechanical industries. With these exceptions, however, the law of employers’ liability has not been changed, and compensation for industrial accidents must be sought by injured employes through a suit for damages against the employer. In 1906 and again in 1908 Congress passed a federal employers’ liability act, limited to common carriers, which, however, represents only development along the lines of negligence law. That is, we are still proceeding upon the assumption that in every accident which occurs somebody is to blame. We shall have to look to foreign countries for a practical application of the principle that the cost of accidents in modern industry should be made a charge upon the industry itself, and ultimately be incorporated in the higher price of the article produced.

Germany was the first country to introduce the principle of compulsory accident insurance in 1884. Employers are there organized into associations and sections and are compelled to bear the expense of granting to injured workingmen compensation, which amounts to about two-thirds their average wages. England in 1897, by the passage of the Workmen’s Compensation Act, adopted the principle “that a workman is entitled for all accidents of occupation to a moderate and reasonable compensation.” Twenty-three countries, or practically all the advanced industrial nations of the world except the United States, have passed laws to compensate sufferers for all accidents of industry, thus 100 placing the burden of industrial accidents upon the industry as such and not upon the laborer.

As we have seen, sickness and old age are still more usual causes of poverty and unemployment than accident. All the arguments for compulsory insurance therefore apply with redoubled force to these evils. Germany was again the pioneer in the establishment of these forms of insurance. In 1883 sickness insurance was organized, being made compulsory for all persons with incomes under $500; the expense is borne one-third by the workers and two-thirds by employers, the main purpose being to secure a sufficient relief--amounting to one-half the wage--for a period of thirteen weeks. In 1889 invalidity and old-age insurance was introduced for the same class; contributions are made in equal proportion by employe and employer, the state contributing about $12 a year to each annuity. Pensions are granted after thirty years of payment or to those over seventy. In 1908 Great Britain passed a still more comprehensive measure, providing for pensioning all citizens of seventy years or over, who have been residents for twenty years, in accordance with a sliding scale based upon private income, the pensions ranging from five shillings weekly down to one shilling. The pensions were expected to cost $35,000,000 the first year, but will probably entail double that amount. Finally, insurance against unemployment was tried in Switzerland in 1893 to 1897, but was finally abolished, owing to abuses and difficulty of administration.

There are probably no more important practical economic problems than those connected with unemployment and workingmen’s insurance. Slowly the conviction has spread that under present conditions of industry workingmen cannot fairly be held responsible for industrial accidents, and that with prevailing wages they cannot be expected to save enough to maintain themselves in sickness and old age. It therefore becomes the duty of society so to organize industry and legislation that the 101 terrors of accidents, sickness, and old age, shall be reduced to a minimum.