Show THE WORLD OF LABOR How to liver Well on a Tory Small Sum A Timely Hint to Those with Small 1ursos local ana National Industrial Notes It is surprising upon how small a sum people can live when they get right down to hard pan I amled to this reflection i by the experience of two friends of mine t They are young men and were thrown out of employment about four weeks ago by the reduction of the force on municipal munici-pal work I met them the other day and finding them still out of work with no very encouraging prospects for a job I was rather surprised to see how cheerful cheer-ful they were over it Knowing they did not get very high wages when at work I asked them how they expected to get along if work did not open up pretty soon They said they thought they could get along for six months but after that it would get pretty rocky for them Continuing Con-tinuing my inquiries I discovered that they were living on about 20 a month and living quite comfortable at that As it may have an Interest for some of the readers of THE HERALD these hard times I will tell you how they managed man-aged it They rented a furnished room in the southeastern part of the town and paid 2 a week for it When they saw that work was likely to fail they quit their boardinghouse boarding-house bought a secondhand gasoline stove some cooking utensils and dishes and went to keeping bach Their entire housekeeping outfit cost them only ell Until they quit they got their own breakfast break-fast and supper and bought their dinners at a cheap restaurant When work shutdown shut-down they got only two meals a day breakfast at 9 and dinner at 4 wiih sometimes some-times a lunch when they went to bed They were reasonably good cooksas a good many men are in the westand their bill of fare and its cost per week was about as follows Meat 50 cents This was generally in the form of beef or mutton stew with quite often a soup bone which they found both nourishing and economical They used nearly every kind of vegetable vege-table in the market potatoes onions cabbage turnips carrots and beans and much of it went into their soup Their vegetables cost them about 40 cents per week butter 20 cents sugar 15 cents coffee 10 cents bread 30 cents milk 25 I cents fruitmostly apple made into sauce and baked25 cents rico and navy beans 15 cents oat meal and corn meal made into porridge and Johnny cake 20 cents gasoline 20 cents extras about 30 cents This makes a total of 3 per week for two men and it struck me as being quite substantial fare for men who were not working A man at hard work would probably need more meat and a larger quantity of other things The only luxury lux-ury they allowed themselves was smoking smok-ing tobacco and they did their own washing wash-ing but of course they didnt wear white frilled shirts or cambric ties They are good managers One of them had got a job of dinging potatoes on shares and expected to get enough to keep them in potatoes all winter After next week they will get all the sweet and sour milk they want to use for milking a neighbors cow each morning They think that on a pinch they might be able to reduce re-duce their expenses 2 or even 3 per month below the present figures and that twith two or three days work per week they could hold out for an indefinite indefin-ite time I commend the example of these two plucky and ingenious young fellows to those who think they will starve to death on anything less than i2 per day The only labor difficulty in Salt Lake this week is that between the brewers and their employers Owing to the general depression the employers propose to reduce re-duce the wages of their men So per monthall around The wages at present range from 65 to 75 per month which the men think is low enough A committee commit-tee has been appointed from the Federated Feder-ated Trades to sea if any amicable adjustment adjust-ment of the difficulty can be arranged It was something of a surprise to hear from Mayor Harrison that there were 200000 unemployed people in Chicago It is doubtless the Mecca towards which thousands of idle men turn their steps and when the great fair closes and thousands thou-sands more arE thrown out of employment employ-ment the city will be confronted by a serious condition It was the presence of many idle men and the existence of serious labor troubles that made possible the Haymarket riot and tragedy of 1886 Judge Mitchell of Minnesota has decided de-cided that any man unless under contract con-tract obligations or his employment charges him with some public duty has a right to refuse to work for or deal with any man or class of men he sees fit and this right which one man may exercise singly any number of men may exerciso jointly While one is free to admit the right of a body of men to refuse to deal with certain other men do they not exceed ex-ceed that right when they use it for the express purpose of ruining other men rather than simply protecting themselves them-selves So an employer has a perfect right to refuse employment to any manor man-or class of men but does that justify him in trying to destroy a labor organization or-ganization by discriminating against men belonging to such an organization It seems as it tho motive must be taken into consideration before any judge or court can decide whether a certain line ot action is an infringement of the rights of an individual State Labor Commissioner BromJingec I of Colorado estimates the number of unemployed un-employed in that state at fully 50000 Over 5000 men have registered as ont of employment in Denver and at least 15000 people have to depend upon charity for I support The condition in the small towns within a radius of 150 miles from the city is still worse In these places the unemployed have looted stores hotels and restaurants to supply thbir needs The exodus of men to the east continues by the thousand The Federated Trades of Salt Lake have I appointed their committees to arrange for the celebration of Labor Day on September 4 Twentyfour organizations or-ganizations have already signified their intention of participating in the parade with a probability that eight more will ben be-n line It intended that the day shall be given up more to a labor demonstration demonstra-tion than a picnic It is felt that in these times such an occasion should be used tor the spread of information regarding the condition and prospects of labor I hear much complaint that no discrimination dis-crimination is used by employers in discharging dis-charging single men to make room for married men There are many single men who have a mother sisters or young brothers dependent upon them and to discharge such a man to give work to a man who has only a wife to support is not giving work to those who really need it the most A little inquiry on the part of the employers would show them who were the most deserving Another complaint made is that contractors con-tractors are using the present hard times for an excuse to cut down wages unnecessarily unneces-sarily Many of those employers mado their contracts before the hard times came on and the amount they receive is not affected by present conditions They based their estimates upon having to pay fair wages and the attempt to reduce wages is simply an attempt on the part of contractors to get higher profits than they otherwise would This certainly seems an unfair advantage to take of the workingmen in their present helpless conditionf is also stated that a great many interior workmen are Being put on in place of skilled competent workmen I The unemployed continue to arrive in Salt Lake at the rate of several score every veek A leading contractor tells me he has from twentyfive to thirty applications applica-tions for work every day The labor unions believe much of the continued increase in-crease of the number of unemployed in the city is due to the injudicious advertising adver-tising of Salt Lake as a place where an unusual amount of public and private work going on where business IS better bet-ter attractions are greaterand opportunities opportun-ities more numerous than in any other city of its size It is all right to make the best of a bad situation but an attempt to boom the city for the benefit of real estate speculators and the disappointment of hundreds of workmen ought to be discouraged dis-couraged It should be clearly understood under-stood that Salt Lake has no need of anymore any-more laborers that hundreds of those already al-ready here can find no employment and that the only need we have of capital is in productive enterprises The man who comes here simply to invest and then sit down and wait for a rise we have no earthly use for We have too many of them already The biggest strike that has taken place I in England since the strike of the London dockers was begun last week by the coal miners of England It was ordered by tho miners federation and directly affects something like 350000 miners The cause of the strike was a reduction in wages of 25 per cent The mineowners justified the reduction on theground that as prices of coal had declined 35 per cent since 1891 the miners ought to give back a portion por-tion of the 40 per cent advance they have received since 1889 The miners reason that as the output of coal has continued to increase the reduction of prices is not warranted by the state of trade Prices of coal have risen despite statements of an overstocked market and many ironworks iron-works and factories are running short of fuel and must close down unless tho supply sup-ply of fuel is soon increased DRESSER |