10 INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION AND WAGES

arbitration, no fundamental principles were evolved or
generally accepted prior to the World War. In arbitration
 proceedings, stress was placed by labor upon the
arduousness of their work, or, in other words, upon the
actual physical sacrifices they were forced to make, and
the physical conditions under which their occupations
required them to toil. The groups above the unskilled and
semi-skilled workers generally demanded differentials over
basic rates of pay according to the skill, hazard, and responsibilities
 of their duties. These factors were, as a rule,
recognized and given consideration. The potent influence
in transmitting them into concrete terms of compensation,
however, was usually dependent upon the relative degree
of organization present and of the economic results which
could be expected from either party to the case, if there
was a failure to grant satisfactory rates of pay. Guiding
principles were given scant, if any, consideration. Arbitration
 awards were almost without exception an irrational
compromise of the conflicting claims of the parties to a
controversy, popularly described as “splitting the differences.”


Cost oF Living as A Factor 18 WacGe-FIxing

After the year 1900, when prices began generally to
rise, “cost of living” developed as an active factor in wagefixation.
 Compilations of changes in prices of articles
entering into the consumption of the wage-earning classes
were made, and emphasis was placed by labor representatives
 upon the steady decline in the purchasing power of
money wages. This tendency became increasingly apparent
 in negotiations and controversies over wages in all
branches of mining and manufacturing. It was also
brought prominently to the fore-front during the period
of 1910-1915 in formal wage arbitrations between the rail-