Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 64.djvu/184

180 point to a scattering of manufacturing plants; to a spreading out over more ground space in the case of each individual establishment and to more healthful, natural and inviting home and shop surroundings for the working men. One company may own many plants located on one large site or in many different parts of the United States, as circumstances may dictate. The great economies which consolidation permit are in the expense of management, in buying, selling, advertising and the like. These are as readily obtained when the business is carried on in several moderately large establishments as in one mammoth one. Increased facilities for rapid transportation also allow workmen to live many miles from their work. In this connection one more point must be discussed. Employers as well as students of social conditions are beginning to understand that the efficiency and value of workingmen to their employer depends, in a large measure, upon the home and shop conditions and environment. Poorly fed, poorly housed and poorly clothed workmen are not efficient laborers; also, dark, dingy, unsightly, poorly ventilated and badly heated factories are distinctly detrimental to the amount and quality of the work done in them. Looking at the matter from the standpoint of profits, as purely a business proposition, employers are beginning to realize this fact and to attempt to remedy it. The following quotation, taken from a magazine devoted to shop management and economy, illustrates the trend of thought: "The duty of a corporation, like that of an individual, is of a dual nature, viz., toward itself and toward its neighbors. Its duty to itself comprises the necessity of turning out its product cheaply and at the same time excellent in quality. To fulfill these requirements the management must see that the component factors of production are kept in prime condition. The more intelligent the employees and the more efficient their facilities for production, other things being equal, the cheaper and better will be the resultant output. . . . The manager who lives in luxury, without seeming to care for the condition or welfare of his employees, rouses antagonisms, which are not conducive to collaboration with his interests either in the works or in the community." A better grade of workingmen is, as a rule, attracted to a shop located in the suburbs owing to its superior advantages in regard to shop and home environment. The theory of demand and supply is not the sum and substance of economic thought and reasoning. The human element must be considered. Humanitarian principles are beginning to be recognized in the business world and must be reckoned with in the future.

The improvement of the rural school, the increased rural circulation of the daily paper and the magazine, the electric suburban and interurban railroads, improved roads, rural mail delivery, the extension of the telephone service into the rural districts and many other