The Forty-Hour Week
Last week Sir Allan Smith produced a carefully reasoned argument to show the engineering trade unions why the employers could not afford to reduce the hours to forty a week ; the increased costs would diminish sales and increase unemployment. And now comes the reply of the British Government to the proposal of the International Labour Office for the universal reduction of hours to forty a week. The Government do not take a hopeful view of the proposal. If the provision affected hours only and not wages, then the countries where labour is weakest would cut wages and undersell the high-wage countries. And if the full wage were to be paid for a shorter week, the provision would still hit those countries most whose wages-costs were highest. Moreover the rule would be too indiscriminate ; it would be practicable enough in some industries, not in others. The Government's reply to the question, in the form in which it was framed, was inevitable. None the less the general principle of taking advantage of the increased part played by machinery to reduce the number of hours worked by man is one towards which industry, step by step—at varying pace in different industries—should work.
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