Progress and Poverty · Chapter
III: From Combinations of Workmen explained
This chapter examines the limitations and inherent disadvantages of labor combinations and strikes as a means to raise wages.
What happens
This chapter examines the limitations and inherent disadvantages of labor combinations and strikes as a means to raise wages. It argues that while such combinations can increase wages in specific trades, they cannot achieve a general wage increase because the real contest is between laborers and landowners, not labor and capital. The chapter emphasizes that landowners can endure a deadlock far longer than laborers, who would starve, and that the only true remedy lies in addressing land ownership and rent.
Themes in this chapter
Wages and Labor
The chapter focuses on the dynamics of wage determination through labor combinations, strikes, and the inherent difficulties in raising wages.
Land Ownership and Rent
Argues that the real opposition in wage struggles is between laborers and landowners, as rent ultimately absorbs any wage increases.
Distribution of Wealth
Examines how wealth is distributed among labor, capital, and land, and how combinations affect this distribution.
Characters to notice
- Unknown
The narrator, speaking from personal experience as a former union member, analyzes the limitations of labor combinations.
- Sir Henry Maine
Referenced for his findings on the ancient Hindu practice of 'sitting dharna' and its parallels in Irish Brehon laws.
- David Ricardo
Implicitly referenced through the discussion of rent and distribution, though not named directly in the excerpt.
Key passages
“The owners of the land of England are by virtue of their ownership the masters of England.”
Landowners control England because they own the land.
Highlights the power imbalance between landowners and laborers.
“The methods by which a trade union can alone act are necessarily destructive; its organization is necessarily tyrannical.”
Trade unions must use destructive methods and tyrannical organization to function.
Critique of the inherent flaws in union tactics.
“If the contest were between labor and capital, it would be on much more equal terms.”
A struggle between labor and capital would be more balanced.
Contrasts the real struggle between labor and landowners.