Word: pay
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Furthermore, said Nathan, the workers had earned a raise: "The buying power of hourly rates of pay ... in the steel industry increased one-seventh between 1939 and 1949, whereas productivity per man-hour rose by 50% ... In the short run, changes in productivity are more affected by changes in ... labor skill than by technology." (Another labor witness later conceded that "it is almost impossible to separate the contributions made by the worker, the machine, or management to increased productivity...
According to union statistics, the steel companies could afford to pay. For the first half of 1949, the union said, profits of the 19 leading companies were estimated at $301 million, up 54.6% from 1948's first half (when operations were slowed down by a coal strike). In fact, said Nathan, profits had been even larger; many companies had hidden them in swollen depreciation funds. In the end, he argued, the raise would be good for the entire U.S., since "higher wages are proposed as a means of lifting buying power...
...modernization programs. This, and not increased labor efficiency, was the reason for higher productivity, they said. Furthermore, the rate of steel production had dropped 15% in the last six months and profits were down. Some small companies, like Lukens Steel Co., insisted that they could not afford to pay increases at the current rate of earnings. Said Lukens' Robert Wolcott: "Wage increases can't be paid out of past profits . . . [In] the four-week . . . period ending July 9, 1949 . . . Lukens . . . showed a net loss...
Saxophone & Type. A onetime coal-miner, logger, ranch hand, construction worker and saxophone player, Tennessee-born Will Harrison broke into journalism in Gallup, N. Mex., where he was stranded in 1932. He worked without pay...
Saxophone & Type. A onetime coal-miner, logger, ranch hand, construction worker and saxophone player, Tennessee-born Will Harrison broke into journalism in Gallup, N. Mex., where he was stranded in 1932. He worked without pay...