AN INDUSTRIAL CRISIS APPROACHING
What Will Happen When Wages Tumble After the War? — Will There Be Riot and Bloodshed?
SOBER thoughts fill the minds of many of the world's best thinkers as they look into the future. Tremendous changes have occurred during the past two years. The times have been vibrant with intensity. The wheels of industry have, in this nation, whipped up their speed. America is enjoying the "most abounding prosperity in her history of a century and a half." Never have such high wages been paid to the workers — two dollars a day for the cheapest form of labor, and up to forty-five dollars a day for workers in some of the munition factories. Yet grave apprehensions are felt over the industrial complications that will inevitably follow the present war. Strikes from Shore to Shore
ACCORDING to the Current Opinion for July, "there is a cloud on the horizon. It is no bigger than a man's hand, and yet it is a cloud that may wreck American prosperity." Illustrating the statement by concrete facts, the magazine quoted continues: "In spite of high wages, we never before had as many impending strikes as we now have. In spite of the rapid advance of the eight-hour day, we never before had as many impending strikes. At the time of writing this, strikes are impending among all telegraph operators from Chicago to New York, among all train men, among all garment workers, among the anthracite coal miners.
"Munition workers are receiving all the way from forty-five dollars a day down to three dollars a day, and there is not a munition plant in the country, from Bridgeport to Calgary, where strikes have not taken place and are not impending. Longshoremen and dock men netting six dollars to four dollars a day are on strike in one harbor. Longshoremen and munition workers, the latter receiving four times as much as a foreman who has spent ten years preparing for his job, four times as much as a banker who has spent ten years preparing for his job, nine times as much as a teacher or college professor who has spent seven years preparing for his job, are on strike for one of two things — higher wages or shorter hours; in some cases both.
"As long as our abounding prosperity lasts, we can pay the higher wages for the shorter hours, raise the cost of living to meet the higher wages for the shorter hours, and raise the wages to pay the higher cost of living for the higher wages and shorter hours — what the late James J. Hill described as 'a fatal spiral' to a peak, from which we might all tumble over a precipice. That is, as long as the war lasts and we are wallowing in prosperity from the misfortunes of others. But when the war stops, what? Wages shoot up, but they cannot come down without causing a riot or a strike.
"The extremists say that wages are bound to go up and up, and hours to come down and down, until labor has expropriated capital. Capital says, the minute higher wages and shorter hours destroy returns, industry will be wrecked and ruined. Between these two is a chasm. He who bridges the chasm will avert catastrophe." WILL there be a tumble in wages when the war is over? And will the multitudes of workers accustomed to big wages stand idly submissive under the very shadow of the fabulous war fortunes heaped together by the financial reapers from the war's harvest?
There is an undeniable feeling of suppressed anxiety over the outlook. There is a strong presentiment that somehow human history is approaching a crisis. But who can throw light on this difficult problem? Who can read the future? Surely it is beyond the ken of the human mind. Yet there is One who knows the end from the beginning — the living God.
And "we have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place." 2 Peter 1: 19.
In this sure word, even the forebodings that now fill men's hearts are foretold. After delineating those "signs" which were to serve as precursors of the second coming of King Jesus — the "distress of nations, with perplexity," and so forth — the inspired description continues, "men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth."
We have reached the time foretold. We have reached the time of the "distress of nations" pictured in advance, and now men's hearts are filled with forebodings over "those things which are coming on the earth."
We are approaching a crisis — the world's crisis. It will be felt in every sphere of human activity. It will belt the globe. WE are swiftly approaching the time foretold by the apostle James in these significant words:
"Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall443eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days. Behold, the hire of the laborers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth. Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter. Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you. Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the Judge standeth before the door." James 5: 1-9. BUT above this dark international industrial storm, with all its rumblings and mutterings of hate, with its lurid flashes of violence, is seen the rainbow of promise. "The coming of the Lord draweth nigh." The world's industrial strife will end at the second coming of Christ. It can never be settled by human wisdom. Socialism can never bring about a settlement.
This is not pessimism. Earnest, thoughtful men everywhere see the dangers that threaten. It is well to face facts squarely. The student of God's word looks above these dark, distressing scenes, beyond these clashes of might against might, and fixes his hope on the return of Jesus. This will be the Christian's anchor in the coming industrial storm. L. E. F.