last thirty or forty years, and the use of high-speed steel for cutting-tools, of turret lathes, screw and gear-cutting mechanisms and other inventions, has made it possible for one man to do now the work that formerly was done by several men. In spite of these changes, the number of persons employed in England and Wales as engine and machine makers, millwrights, fitters, turners, tool-makers, watch-makers, etc., is as follows:

In the printing trade similar improvements have been made, not by one sweeping change that has revolutionised the industry, but by the continuous invention of machines that carry out a process or a part of a process with less labour than formerly. The last forty years have seen the invention of composing machines by which one man can set as many letters as five or six men working by hand. The growth in the size and the speed of the printing machinery, and the use of many automatic appliances, have probably increased the output per person employed in printing sheets to nearly the same extent. The modern novel is now bound by a series of complicated machines, whereas some forty years ago all the processes except two or three were carried out by hand. Under the conditions of hand labour it needed the work of about 450 women and of about 600 men for an hour to produce 5000 cloth-bound novels of the usual size. By the use of labour-saving machinery the same work can now be done by about 130 women and about 170 men in an hour, i.e., what formerly required approximately 1050 hours of labour to produce is now completed in approximately 300 hours.

The increase in the output of newspapers per man employed is as great as or greater than in other forms of printing. The printing industry shows how necessary it is, when considering the effect of machinery on employment, not to examine only the actual trade or part of the trade concerned, but to consider the reaction owing to increased output on the industries that are allied to it. The much greater use of machinery in the printing industry has coincided with improved education, and the cheapening of books and newspapers has caused a very large increase in the number of persons engaged as booksellers and newspaper dealers to distribute the greater output made possible by the use of machinery.

The numbers employed in England and Wales in printing, binding and lithographing, are as follows:

These figures conclusively prove that the use of labour-saving machinery does not permanently reduce the number of persons employed, but, on the contrary, actually increases it. The comparison of the percentages of increase of the population and of persons employed in the engineering and printing trades is

In

The arguments apply with varying force to all the great industries of the country, with the exception of agriculture. the thirty years from 1881 to 1911 the Census shows that the number of persons in England and Wales engaged in industrial occupations, which include those trades affected by labour-saving machinery, had grown from 6,373,367 to 9,468,238, or an increase of 48 per cent. In the same period the population had grown from 25,974,439 to 36,070,492, or an increase of only 38 per cent. In the same period the number of persons in agriculture had dropped from 1,383,184 to 1,291,828. This was due to two causes. The fall in the prices of agricultural produce had led to more land being laid down to grass, and thus less labour was required, and at the same time labour-saving machinery, such as steam ploughs, reapers and binders, mowing and sowing machines, was used. The possible output of manufactured goods is limited by the amount of labour and machinery available, which can easily be increased. The output of agriculture is strictly limited by the number of acres available, and therefore labour-saving machinery does tend permanently to reduce the number of persons employed in this industry.

In order to strengthen his argument, the author cites two companies: one whose capital was five times greater in 1920 than in 1919, and no more hands were employed in 1922, and the other whose 1919 capital had grown twelve and a half times in 1920, though the labour had not been increased. Is it fair or reasonable to compare the boom of 1919-20 with the slump of 1922 ? In 1920 wages and materials were rising rapidly, banks were calling in their loans, and much more working capital was needed, and orders were so plentiful that new factories were built or rented and additional machinery ordered. In 1922 machinery was standing idle, and many employees were discharged, as there was no work. Some of the increased capital may be due to the capitalisation of reserves, and thus the actual capital employed has not been increased.

The writer also makes the following statement :

To-day in our own Government offices thousands of young girls are engaged at the age of fourteen and upwards to operate calculating machines. These young people are employed on the distinct understanding that at the age of eighteen they will be superannuated. They commence at a salary of ten shillings per week and receive yearly increments of two shillings.

Careful inquiries have been made, and nowhere have these conditions been found. The only information was that some temporary work of the character mentioned was paid for at the rate of twenty shillings per week, rising to twenty-two shillings and sixpence per week, and was for special work connected with the recent Census. These girls were definitely told that their engagement would only last about eighteen months, and there was no question of their being dismissed at the age of eighteen. A colossal and occasional task, such as the Census, necessitates a great deal of temporary work, and it is unfair thus to blame the Government for putting young people into so-called 'blind alley jobs,' and to mention a salary which is exactly one-half the amount which was paid.

It is evident from the above arguments that the invention of labour-saving machinery does not permanently create unemployment, but instead increases the number of persons engaged. In addition it brings within the purchasing power of the worker goods, services, and amenities, which would otherwise be beyond his reach, if it had not been for the reduced cost due to mass production and the greater use of machinery. Although this is the final result of the inventions of the last few generations, it must not be forgotten that at the time of the introduction of the new machinery there is a displacement of labour. The older and less efficient workers are more likely to lose their jobs than those who are younger and more able to adapt themselves to the

new methods. The greater subdivision and demarcation of labour make it more difficult for a workman to transfer his energies to any other section of the trade to which he belongs, and the result may be that some who are displaced may never be able to secure again regular and permanent employment. It is the duty of all who are engaged in industry to mitigate as far as possible the suffering and loss that may be caused to some workers by the onward march of invention which brings to the whole community so many advantages.

W. HOWARD HAZELL.

THE SERVICE MAN'S HOME-COMING

A LITTLE group of ex-soldiers was breaking up after an intimate gossip about old times.

After all,' said one of them, 'some of us can't help thinking that we fought the war for nothing.'

There was none of the rage of despair in the speaker's voice. His slight shrug of the shoulders expressed his sense of disillusion, and hinted that there was no more to be said about it. They had been fighting their battles over again, as men do when they get together among themselves, traversing old familiar ground where the voices of sergeants had once filled the air, or someone had won praise by a profitable feat of scrounging, or Jerry's boisterousness had jerked the heart into the mouth. All for nothing.' Well, that's that. 'C'est comme ça,' as they said in the estaminets. They were not thinking of getting up ex-service men's protest meetings. They had never done that kind of thing. They left that to men whom they thought of as A.S.C. orderlies, or ex-munition workers of the Bolshevik brand, or politicians with an axe to grind. They were not the sort that clamoured to have women turned out of jobs to make way for their own deserving selves. They were just average examples of the ordinary ex-service man, who carries on as he has always done, grousing from time to time, taking an interest in football, luxuriating on rare occasions in the secret, forbidden joy of reminiscence, recalling-but only with the men who had shared it-that vivid experience which was their one, their unique, claim to distinction.

not meant to convey Rather they suggested

'All for nothing.' The words were reproaches against an ungrateful country. a fatalism steeped in bitterness deeper than that of the men who complained that they had rendered services and had been forgotten. For theirs was not a complaint about services unrewarded; it was the revealing sense of disillusion, showing that they had never rendered a service; that they had gone, not as 'heroes,' but on a fool's errand to fight in a war that was not worth fighting. They had endured the unsightly, dirty life of the battle-fields with a cheery and modest sense of merit, with a belief that they were making some contribution to a good cause