Page:Can a man be a Christian on a pound a week? - Hardie.djvu/17

 the same wages and finds it hard enough to keep things going, competition being keen and profits low. One day a big order comes into the market, and rather than lose it or share it B agrees to fulfil it for 5 per cent, less than the prevailing price. As, however, this absorbs all the prospective profit, and as the works are run primarily to make profit, B cuts down wages to recoup himself for what he regards as his loss. But other buyers demand that prices for them shall be cut 5 per cent. also. Now under these circumstances what is A to do? He may refuse to lower prices and wages, and in process of time see his works standing idle, whilst B’s are increasing in size, or he may follow B’s lead and cut down prices and wages also. The illustration is neither exaggerated or overdrawn. It represents what is occurring every day. But if it be correct, how is it possible for “Christian employers to give to their workmen what is necessary not only to relieve the pressure of existence, but to make work and life enjoyable?” Employers whose business is not a practical monopoly are at the mercy of the most unscrupulous of their number, which again raises the question of whether that is a Christian system in which the selfish rule and the good are compelled to follow the bad?

So far as I can see there are but two ways of escape from this condition of affairs. One is for the employers in a given industry to combine together, merge all their conflicting interests into one common interest, and form what is known as a Trust, in other words a Monopoly. By this method they avoid competing one with the other, and are able to say to buyers, As you cannot buy what you want anywhere else save