CHAPTER III 
THE WAR PERIOD—AN INTERREGNUM 
The period of our participation in the Great War, so 
far as any bearing upon the principles or theories of wages 
was concerned, actually constituted an interregnum. Dur- 
ing part of the year 1917 and the whole of 1918, the 
previous movement toward constructive change practically 
ceased. It was lost sight of in the all-absorbing problem 
of maintaining and accelerating industrial production for 
essential war purposes. 
While the war was going on, “wages and hours of 
labor,” as has been correctly stated, “were rarely deter- 
mined upon a sound or scientific basis. As a rule, the 
governing factor was necessity. . . . Speeding up and 
increasing production were the first considerations in every 
industry ; the cost was a factor of second importance or 
of no importance whatsoever. . .. Employers began 
bidding against each other for skilled workers, and soon 
found themselves obliged to resort to the same tactics to 
secure any kind of labor. . . . This meant that wage-rates 
were adjusted largely on the basis of the maximum de- 
mands of employees as modified by the maximum con- 
cessions which could be wrung from employers.” 
NecessaARY CONTROL oF CAPITAL AND LABOR 
This end was finally accomplished by the government 
arranging a truce for the period of the war between capital 
and labor, and the establishment of the War Industries 
Board, the Labor Policies Board, and the National War 
gan Tie Industrial Code,” Lauck and Watts. Funk & Wagnalls Company,