done much to embitter the mind of the workers, and to teach them to believe that they could only get what was their due from the State. By their action in the matter of piece-rates they have helped to increase the prejudice among the workers against being paid on this system, and so have done much to produce that deadly view, so fatal to efficient production, that the best workers should limit their pace to that of the average or of the worst.
It was no inherent wickedness that led them to make these mistakes. They were quite ordinary human beings doing their best according to their lights. But they looked to the interest of the moment, and their mental horizon was bounded by the date of their next balance sheet. If they had looked further ahead they would have seen that it would pay them well in the long run to pay, not the lowest wage at which they could get their work done, but the highest that their business could stand; and that if a man earned much at piece-work that was not a reason for cutting down the piece-rate, but for encouraging him to make more. They have been very conscious of the fact that they risk their money. Have they always remembered that some of the worst-paid wage-earners risk their lives?
