This leaves nothing for clothes, recreation, or sickness.And yet many of the girls are receiving, not $4.50, but $2.75, $3, and $3.50per week.They must have clothes and recreation, and-Man to Man so oft injust, Is always so to Woman.
At the Trades Union Congress now being held in London, the Gasworkers' Union moved that instructions be given the Parliamentary Committee to introduce a bill to prohibit the employment of children under fifteen years of age.Mr.Shackleton, Member of Parliament and a representative of the Northern Counties' Weavers, opposed the resolution on behalf of the textile workers, who, he said, could not dispense with the earnings of their children and live on the scale of wages which obtained.The representatives of 514,000 workers voted against the resolution, while the representatives of 535,000workers voted in favor of it.When 514,000 workers oppose a resolution prohibiting child-labor under fifteen, it is evident that a less-than-living wage is being paid to an immense number of the adult workers of the country.
I have spoken with women in Whitechapel who receive right along less than 25 cents for a twelve-hour day in the coat-making sweat shops;and with women trousers finishers who receive an average princely and weekly wage of 75 cents to $1.
A case recently cropped up of men, in the employ of a wealthy business house, receiving their board and $1.50 per week for six working days of sixteen hours each.The sandwich men get 27 cents per day and find themselves.The average weekly earnings of the hawkers and costermongers are not more than $2.50 to $3.The average all common laborers, outside the dockers, is less than $4 per week, while the dockers average from $2 to $2.25.These figures are taken from a royal commission report and are authentic.