OUR INDUSTRIAL PROBLEMS. 
By “Conspectus” 
(D. B. COPELAND, Professor of Commerce, University of Mel. 
bourne, and F. R, E. MAULDON, Senior 
Lecturer in Economics, University of Methourne.) 
AWARDED FIRST PRIZE OF £50. 
I. Not the least barrier to the under 
standing of our industrial problems is the 
tuman tendency to want simple, direct 
and exclusive solutions. The very coms 
plexity of the industrial life of a modern 
community should suggest that the prob. 
lems of to-day are a tangled skein out of 
which man is secking to make his pat- 
tern of progress. In other words, we must 
see our present situation in the light of 
historical tendencies in conflict. No sitnple 
set of conditions gave vise to and sustain- 
ed these trends; no simple set of solutions 
will cause them suddenly to coalesce. We 
may thus hope most profitably to create 
better industrial relationships by seeking 
means of making many existing tendencies 
sonverge abt points where they seem to 
iveree. 
(b) surrender Ly the directors of ine 
dustry and commerce of their old 
prerogatives and autocratic claimg to 
leadership independent of the organ. 
ised forces of labour. 
The present inchoate conditions of in. 
dustry suggest that this stage has been 
reached in Australia as elsewhere. The 
problem, therefore, at the present time 
i3 to produce a realisation that we have 
reached an historical stage of stalmate. 
What is the essence of the quarrel be. 
tween the contending forces? At bottom 
it is still the age-old problem of the equite 
able distribution of the material means to a 
full life—of wealth and income. Many we 
expect in the nearer future any substan. 
tial changes in the sharing of the national 
wealth an income, cven with the maximum 
of co-operation replacing the present dig. 
sidence? To begin with, who precisely 
constitute the contending classes? It ig 
a vicious distinction which groups all 
wage-earners as the workers and all ems 
ployers as the non-workers, It is an equally 
vicious assumption that enlightened wage- 
earners think always.in terms of such a 
distinetion. But the thoughtful wage» 
earner does think clearly in terms of the 
distinction between income from property 
as such and earnings from work as such, 
just as he is often equally at a loss to 
imagine how far the one or the other may 
be the source of income of any particular 
individual. Even ag a thoughtful worker 
he holds a conviction hard to dislodge that 
work should in equity receive a greater 
share than it does. 
Up to the end of the 19th century 
the abilities of industrial and commercial 
leaders tended to concentrate on the more 
narrowly technical problems of produce 
tion and exchange, to the relative neglect 
of the problems of human relations in 
business. It was inevitable, under such 
conditions, of incomplete realisation of 
all that was implied in the swift strides 
being made in the industrial and com- 
mercial arts, that trade unionism should 
tend to concentrate on the strategy and 
tactics of defence and offence, This has 
resulted in the building up of strong ne- 
trative controls of industrial development 
py the workers, But the time was certain 
fo come when negative control should 
produce two results: 
(a) obstructiveness to progress at a stags 
when further advance in living stan. 
dards would be alone possible with 
the complete co-operation of organised 
labour forces with organised directive 
lorces. 
Distribution of Income, 
2. Statistics have been published for 
several countries giving the proportion of 
she total national income going to work 
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