78 MINIMUM WAGE LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES

wage.” They are called upon to equalize the earnings of the home
worker with those of the shopworker in order to suppress the particularly
 gross form of sweating from which female home workers
suffer.
The local boards, composed of delegates of employers and of employees,
 presided over by the justice of the peace of the district, are
called upon to ascertain the prices per hour which are prevalent
for the women employed in workshops of the same industry in the
same district. The average wages of women working in the workshops
 become the minimum wages of women working at home,
thereby protecting them against exaggerated exploitation.
Committees of experts, established in a different way, are then
called upon to verify the length of time necessary for the production
of the different articles; there remains then the simple task of
multiplying the minimum wage per hour, fixed by the wages board,
by the number of hours indicated as necessary by the commission of
experts, in order to arrive at the minimum wage for the particular
piece. These rates are published and become legally binding if no
complaint is made during three months. In case of complaint a central
 commission in Paris, presided over by a member of the supreme
court, renders final judgment.
The machinery of the French law is rather ingenious. It avoids
the necessity of excursions into the realm of social justice and enables
the two kinds of committees established to remain within the limits
of verification of facts—on unquestioned logical ground.
Rules of Enforcement

THE law at first proposed by the Government and as passed had a
rather serious shortcoming. The inspectors of factories who, in
the Anglo-Saxon countries, supervise the application of similar
laws were not vested with any authority to do so in France, beyond
the verification of certain formal rules (posting of the minimum wage
figures in the office where the work is handed over to the workers,
etc.). They had no right to act against employers not paying the
minimum wages prescribed.
One reason given was that the inspectors of factories were overburdened
 with other duties. The real reason, however, for avoiding
enforcement of the law by public authority seems to have been the
desire to make the application of the law less rigid, less official, less
bureaucratic; but opinions were divided even among the high officials
of the Ministry of Labor.
A circular letter of the Minister of Labor to the inspectors dated
July 24, 1915, reminds them that the law does not intrust them with
verification and enforcement as to the actual payment of the minimuin
 wages; but to help toward that end the minister suggests that
the inspectors “remind the employers unofficially that they act
incorrectly and put themselves in danger of civil suits.” Practical
experience from 1915 to 1928 seems to have further modified the
original viewpoint of the authorities. The answer of the French
Government to the questionnaire of the International Labor Office