this, for instance, has been that, without lowering profits, although the price of cloth has been greatly reduced, employers have been able to raise the wages of operatives, and shorten their hours of labor, because machinery has so vastly increased the production for a given outlay. As one of a few facts showing this tendency in the last fifty years, note the following table, taken from the books of the Namquit cotton-mill in Bristol, Rhode Island:
| Kind Of Labor. | 1841. | 1884. |
|---|---|---|
| Card-room help, per week | $3.28 | $5.40 |
| Card-strippers, per week | 4.98 | 6.00 |
| Weavers, per week | 4.75 | 6.00 |
| Carding-room overseer, per week | 7.00 | 13.50 |
The hours per week have decreased in the same time from 84 to 66, while the product of the mill in pounds has increased 25 per cent. It may be unnecessary, perhaps, to say that these figures represent the current wages in [pg 230] other mills at the same periods; and that these facts can be sustained by the records of other mills.
In its economic effect we must also consider, under efficiency, the whole question of natural advantages of soil, climate, and natural