Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 87.djvu/56

52 sanitation if need be till marriage sets them free. This and other reasons which have kept women wage earners from adopting union ideals in the past are still operative it is true, but the more intelligent are beginning to see the benefits of organization, and are uniting with others of their trade for mutual betterment. Union men have not always been friendly toward unions for women, chiefly for the reason that they feared the acceptance of women into their ranks might militate against increased wage scales. Their attitude has changed, however, and this has had its share in stimulating an interest in organization among even young women workers.

Many persons interested in social betterment are now growing sanguine over the possible future of women's unions, owing to certain successes achieved by them in the garment and other trades in recent years. Hitherto the union has flourished most in time of stress. There is inspiration in a fight, and, moreover, a fight is sometimes necessary to overcome injustice. But these working women need, too, the ministry of peace, and when the unions shall have passed through their militant stage, the women workers will doubtless be the gainers. Union women are now standing shoulder to shoulder in their effort to obtain higher wages, shorter hours and healthful conditions of work. If they have these, they say they can provide themselves with opportunities for education, and recreation, and other desirable things in life. They are fighting for a chance to work, and a chance to live.

The other form of industrial betterment under discussion is that carried on by more or less philanthropic employers, and through the National Civic Federation called "welfare work." Such work is as varied as the employer's appreciation of needs, or ingenuity in suggesting remedies for existing difficulties. With one it may take the form of shower baths, and a system of profit-sharing; with another hot noon-day lunches and dancing classes; while still another may discharge what he considers his duty by providing club rooms for men, and aprons for women. But whatever the method pursued, vastly better physical conditions have resulted. Welfare work has given us model factories, and beautiful surroundings must ever be an incentive to right living.

Several hundred employers in the United States are carrying on some form of betterment work for their employees, while ten or a dozen stand out prominently for their unusual, even notable, undertakings. In general, welfare work may be said to include: (1) improved physical conditions; (2) opportunity for rest and recreation; (3) educational work; (4) benefit funds.

Now each of these things is good in itself, and employees, while as a rule willing to recognize the truth of this, yet are more or less suspicious of their employers' undertakings. They do not object to the