Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 82.djvu/166

162 is probably equally true that he does not strive for these things out of any consideration for the employee, but rather because it increases production. He sees, however, that the one necessarily implies the other. His first step in the attainment of his end has been the invention of a new system of wage payment, and he has been increasingly successful in this direction. But in doing so, he has so far neglected to purposely emphasize the ultimate aim that his critics have lost sight of it altogether. The result is that in many instances the unionist fails to understand his motive, and the employer does not see its necessity.

The problem of the efficiency of labor is therefore but a phase of the far wider problem of distribution. What the advocates of labor legislation and reform are striving to do from the point of view of the wage-earner, the efficiency expert is endeavoring to secure, though he may not realize it, from the standpoint of the employer. It would be well if this fact were more generally understood, for then the difficulties would be solved the sooner, and there would be less working at cross-purposes. And, after all, it is as Theodore Roosevelt said recently at Columbus: