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[XI.
1.]
No
attention has been paid to the essential distinction between how far men
work through machines and how far they work as machines."
[Wilhelm Schulz, pp. 69]
...."In the future life of the nations,
however, the mindless forces of nature operating in machines will be our
slaves and servants."
[Wilhelm Schulz, pp. 74]
...."In the English spinning mills,
only 158,818 men are employed, compared with 196,818 women. For every
100 men workers in the Lancashire cotton mills, there are 103 women workers'
in Scotland, the figure is as high as 209. In the English flax mills in
Leeds, there are 147 women for every 100 men workers; in Dundee, and on
the east coast of Scotland, this figure is as high as 280. In the English
silk-factories, there are many women workers; in the wool factories, where
greater strength is needed, there are more men. As for the North American
cotton mills, in 1833 there were no fewer than 38,927 women alongside
18,593 men. So, as a result of changes in the organisation of labour,
a wider area of employment opportunities has been opened up to members
of the female sex... more economic independence for women... both sexes
brought closer together in their social relations." [Wilhelm Schulz,
pp. 71-2]
...."Employed in the English spinning
mills operated by steam and water in the year 1835 were: 20,558 children
between 8 and 12 years of age; 35,867 between 12 and 13; and, finally,
108,208 between 13 and 18....True, the advances in mechanization, which
remove more and more of the monotonous tasks from human hands, are gradually
[XII.
1.]
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[XI.
2.]
of organisation of the instruments of labour.
...."Similarly,
in the sphere of industry every factory and every workshop is a more comprehensive
combination of a larger material property with numerous and varied intellectual
abilities and technical skills which have as their shared aim the development
of production.... Where legislation preserves the unity of large landed
properties, the surplus quantity of a growing population crowds together
into industry, and it is therefore mainly in industry that the proletariat
gathers in large numbers, as in Great Britain. But, where legislation
allows the continuous division of the land, as in France, the number of
small, debt-ridden proprietors increases and many of them are forced into
the class of the needy and the discontented. Should this division and
indebtedness go far enough, in the same way as big industry destroys small
industry; and since larger landholding complexes once more come into being,
many propertyless workers no longer needed on the land are, in this case
too, forced into industry." [Schulz, pp. 58-9]
...."The character of commodities of
the same sort changes as a result of changes in the nature of production,
and in particular as a result of mechanisation. Only by eliminating human
labour has it become possible to spin from a pound of cotton worth 3s.
8d., 350 hanks worth 25 guineas and 167 miles in length." [Schulz,
p. 62]
...."On average, the prices of cotton
goods have fallen by 11/12ths over the past 45 years, and according to
Marshall's calculations a quantity of manufacture costing 16s. in 1814
now cost 1s. 10d. The drop in prices of industrial products has meant
both a rise in home consumption and an increase in the foreign market;
as a result, the number of cotton workers in Great Britain not only did
not fall after the introduction of machinery, but rose from 40,000 to
1.5 million.
[XII.
2.]
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[XI.
3.]
....(3)
The landlord is in a position to demand more rent from the tenant farmer
the less wages the tenant pays out, and the more rent the landlord demands
the further the tenant pushes down the wages. For this reason, the landlord's
interest is just as opposed to that of the farm labourer as the manufacturer's
is to that of the workers. It likewise pushes wages down to a minimum.
....(4) Since a real reduction in
the price of manufactured products puts up the rent of land, the landowner
has a direct interest in depressing the wages of the factory worker, in
competition among the capitalists, in overproduction and in all the misery
occassioned by industry.
....(5) So the interest of the landowner,
far from being identical with the interest of society, is fiercely opposed
to the interests of the tenants, the farm labourers, the factory workers,
and the capitalists. But, as a result of competition, the interest of
one landowner is not even identical with that of another. We shall now
take a look at competition.
....Generally speaking, large landed property
and small landed property are in the same relation to one another as large
and small capital. In addition, however, there are special circumstances
which lead, without fail, to the accumulation of large landed property
and the swallowing up of small properties.
[XII.
3.]
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