PRE-WAR PRINCIPLES AND METHODS 13

to eliminate territorial differentials in wage-rates.! Standardization
 had been generally put into effect in railway
service, with the exception of a favorable differential in
rates of pay in the West over the East and Southeast.
Wartime investigations, however, disclosed the fallacy of
the traditional idea, extending back to the California “gold
rush” of 1849, that cost of living was higher in the West
than in the East. As a consequence, the United States
Railroad Administration practically standardized wagerates
 for almost all classes of railway employees on the
hasis of the country as a whole.
A further aspect of standardization of wage-rates was
also evident in the pre-war period in connection with the
methods of adjusting wages in the navy yards and arsenals.
 It was provided by law that the boards charged with
determining wage standards should investigate conditions
in the territory adjacent to government arsenals and yards
and make their findings on the basis of rates paid for
similar work in private industries.
Still another vital question relative to standardization
prior to the war, and which is still the center of much
controversy, had to do with the standardizing of rates of
pay and working conditions of skilled occupations, as in
the building and metal trades. With the increasing division
 of labor resulting from the constant extension of the
use of machinery, skilled work, such as for example that
of machinists, became more and more subdivided. Machine
workers were utilized to a constantly greater extent on
processes which had before been done by hand. Skilled
crafts became concerned in making their occupational

1 “The Arbitral Determination of Railway Wages,” by J. Noble Stockett,
Ir., 1918, Chapter I, Standardization. Exhibit entitled “Standardization’® or
Extracts from Pre-War Arbitration Awards Submitted to U. S. R. R. Labor
Board, Chicago, 1921, by Railway Employees’ Department, American Federation
 of Labor. “Report of the Eight-Hour Commission,”’ Washington, Government
 Printing Office, 1916. Feis, “Principles of Wage Settlement.” Chapter IL.

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