CHAP. 6.—MINIMUM WAGE FOR WOMEN IN UNITED STATES 49

setts the boards have to take into account, besides the needs of the
employees, “ the financial condition of the occupation and the probable
 c¢ffect thereon of an increase in the minimum wages paid ” 25—
8 combination of the principle of “living wage” and of 5 “ wage
the trade can bear.”
Wisconsin, in its original law of 1913, stated that the minimum
wage should be “sufficient to enable the employee receiving it to
maintain himself or herself under conditions consistent with his or
her welfare.” 26 The amendment of 1925, enacted to meet the constitutional
 difficulties, states:
No wage paid or agreed to be paid by an employer to any adult female shall
De oppressive. Any wage lower than a reasonable and adequate compensation
for the services rendered shall be deemed oppressive and is hereby prohibited.
Considered in conjunction with the authority given for exemption
of employers financially unable to meet the requrements, this rule
constitutes a combination of the “living wage ” principle with the
principle of “ the wage the trade can bear.”
In Massachusetts in the men’s clothing and raincoat trade in
1917 the cost of living was estimated at $10 a week, while $9 was fixed
as the minimum wage.?® In the men’s furnishings trade the same
year the difference was greater—cost of living, $10.45; minimum
wage, $9. The cost of living for workers in the retail millinery trade
in 1918 was estimated at $11.64 while the minimum wage was $10.
These differences arose both from the stipulation of the law and from
the necessity, in the deliberations of the boards, of reaching compromises,
 but the differences are small. More hardship was created
through the fact that the rates remained behind the cost of living in
times of increasing prices. But that refers more to the period of
rapidly fluctuating prices during and immediately after the war than
to the present more stable conditions. While the Massachusetts law
has been criticized as not guaranteeing a real living wage, yet
improvement in conditions in recent years is admitted.?®
Enforcement

In Massachusetts the names of firms which do not pay the prescribed
 minimum wage are published, in order to awaken public
opinion. That method proved more effective for shopkeepers, who
need the public good will, than for industries which resell to other
Industries—for instance, paper-box manufacturers—or for super-Intendents
 of office buildings. From a very detailed study of the
number of violations in the different trades, Prof. Arthur F. Lucas *
concludes, however, that the total number of failures to comply with
the minimum wage reached only 3 or 4 per cent. He claims that enforcement
 was made rather too easy by the fact that only low rates
were prescribed. We have already seen (above) to what extent

#7, 8. Bureau of Labor Statistics Bul. No. 870: Labor Laws of the United States,
Washington, 1925, p. 327.
2 Idem, p. 1143.
¥ American Labor Legislation Review, New York, December, 1925, p. 302.
® National Industrial Conference Board : Minimum Wage Legislation in Massachusetts,
New York, 1827, p. 73.
® Idem, p. 104.
© American Economic Review, New Haven, March, 1924, p. 40: “A recommendatory
Piaimun wage law: The first decade of the Massachusetts experiment,” by Arthur
cher Lucas.