Wage Concessions by Trade Unions

Report Outline
One-Year Reduction in Wages of Railroad Labor
Trends of Union Wage Rates and Trade Disputes, 1921–31
Pre-Depression Reductions in Miners' Wages
Wage Reductions During 1930–32 Depression
Wage Rates, Unemployment, and the Cost of Living
Special Focus

One-Year Reduction in Wages of Railroad Labor

Acceptance by the twenty standard railroad unions of a 10 per cent “deduction” from the wages of their members for a period of one year, beginning February 1, 1932, has been followed by a widespread movement among employers of union labor for a general downward revision of union wage rates. Reductions of the wages of unorganized labor and of clerical workers have been in progress for eighteen months or more. Impetus was given the wage reduction movement in “open shop” industries five months ago by the announcement of the United States Steel Corporation that the wage rates of its employees would be lowered by 10 per cent on October 1, 1931. This action was followed by corresponding, or larger, reductions in the copper, aluminum, rubber, electrical and other large-scale industries, so that unorganized labor in these industries has suffered a general reduction of at least 10 per cent.

The agreement reached at Chicago, January 31, 1932, between the railroads and their unionized employees, was not the first in which trade unionists have accepted cuts in pay, but it is the most important to date because of the nation-wide scale of its application. Under the Chicago agreement basic, rates of wages are to remain unchanged, but the railroads are authorized to deduct ten per cent from all wage payments for a period of one year, and they, on their part, are to do all in their power to “maintain and increase railroad employment.” In agreeing to this arrangement, D. B. Robertson, chairman of the Railway Labor Executives' Association, said the unions were influenced by—

1. A desire to do all within their power to aid in lifting the nation out of the worst depression of business we have ever experienced.