EMPLOYMENT PSYCHOLOGY, LABOR, AND INDUSTRY 383 
and larger wages, and sometimes even the desire for a bit 
of violence and excitement to make up for the otherwise 
undisturbed monotony of his days. The operation which 
is so simple that it requires no particular training or edu 
cation commands a dignity and respect which is corre 
spondingly meager. The good wages which piece-workers 
usually receive partly compensate for this lack. How 
ever, piece-work wages have had the effect of increasing 
rather than diminishing the restlessness of the workers. 
The unexpectedly high wages which one class was able 
to earn upset the entire labor market and added enor 
mously to the labor turnover. This unforeseen increase 
in the earnings of piece-workers, and consequent unrest 
among all other workers, made it necessary for industries 
to readjust wages from the very bottom to the very top 
of the scale. Laborers, clerks, journeymen, and even 
salaried officers had to be included in this general read 
justment. 
No one realizes better than the leaders of industry who 
have lived through the rapid progress in the division of 
labor, how much painful truth the above assertions con 
tain, and probably no group of men is more anxious to 
meet this problem in a fundamental way. The condition 
is present. Labor has been divided into minute and 
highly volatile parts. No amount of coercion, either upon 
the part of industrial leaders as a group or laborers as a 
union, can bring about the cure. No amount of preaching 
or doctrine as to the relative duties of capital toward 
labor and labor toward capital can make employment 
conditions healthy. Among the many lessons which the 
war has brought home is the fact that labor is capital 
and capital is labor. The practical solution of this prob 
lem can not be attained by steering a nice middle course