• The differences in occupation within the membership of a union are often wider than those within what may be considered a trade or craft. Some unions, the so-called "industrial" unions, include workmen of several trades within their membership. ... In such unions as these, the question of rating naturally resolves itself at the outset into a separate determination for each of the distinct trades.

Many unions are composed of the members of trades which have been much subdivided in recent years in consequenee of advances in productive methods. The Garment Workers, Ladies' Garment "Workers, Boot and Shoe Workers, Bookbinders, and Laundry Workers, are conspicuous examples of this class. In each of these trades there are subdivisions which require no common apprenticeship, and from one to another of which workers do not ordinarily pass. Each of these subdivisions is virtually a distinct trade or craft from the standpoint of wage rating and is recognized as such by the unions. . . .

[Page 86] Finally, there are unions which maintain distinct minimum rates for groups of workers divided according to the stages of advancement which they have reached in the trade. The International Printing Pressmen's Union is such a union. . . . The Lithographers also fix a series of rates of wide range for their members in charge of presses, according to the size of the press. The Machine Printers' rates for printing wall paper vary in similar fashion with the number of colors printed.

There are many other instances of differentiation in rates within a union according to degree of proficiency. . . . The rates of the Compressed Air Workers vary according to the pounds of pressure under which the work is done. This is partly a matter of physical strength, but also a matter of experience in more difficult work.

There are also unions which set higher rates for groups of men who have specialized on work which is above the skill of the ordinary journeyman. [Various examples] ... In some trades, too, foremen and men "in charge of gangs" are given higher minimum rates. In nearly all of these unions the higher-rated men are in the same unions with the members following the common branch of the trade. Where men are not separately rated, although engaged regularly on work recognized as requiring more skill than is expected of the average journeyman, it is usually because these men are comparatively few in number, or do not feel the need of a higher union rate to secure higher wages, or because the union does not wish the work to be assigned to a specialized class of workmen.

Sometimes a distinction is made in the minimum rate for other reasons than differences in trade skill. The Granite Cutters have a higher rate for outside work than for work done under shelter, to compensate for the exposure and greater lack of regularity in the former. Men working on surface machines are also usually-given higher rates in this union, not because the work requires greater than average skill but on account of the exposure to the fine dust. . . . Sometimes men in the building trades, particularly bricklayers and carpenters, are allowed by their local unions to take special yearly jobs at rates that amount to less per day than the union minimum. These are usually positions with corporations with large establishments which do their own repair work and undertake no building contracts. These positions are exempted from the regular daily rate because the work is not done in competition with contractors in the trade and because the men earn more in the year than members at the minimum.

Rate grouping by competency, opposed [page 94]. The suggestion has often been made to time-working unions that instead of setting a single rate for all men engaged in the same kind of work they should divide their members into classes on the basis of competency and fix a separate rate for each class. Nearly every important time-working union has at some time or other faced a proposal of this kind emanating from the employers or from its own members. The employers have urged that such a plan would remove the chief defect in the minimum rate, that is, the necessity which the employer is under of paying the less competent men the same rate as the good, average man. Within the unions the proposal has been advocated on the ground that it will allow the less proficient members to obtain work and at the same time make it possible to maintain a high minimum for the better men. This policy in rating has naturally been most strongly urged upon those unions in which the differences in efficiency among members doing the same work are very large, a circumstance which throws into greater relief the fact that a large number of men of varying competency are subject to the same minimum rate. The classification of men on the basis of differences in competency has not, however, commended itself generally to the unions. Very few unions now look upon this method of rating with favor or are willing to adopt it except as a temporary expedient. Many of the important time-working unions have had experience with the plan and nearly all of these have fought for its abolition, in nearly all cases with success. . . .

[Page 97] The general rejection by the unions of the system of grading members for wage rating proceeds from the belief that it tends to reduce wages through the competition of the more poorly paid with the better paid workmen. It has usually been found extremely difficult to assign members to their grades so exactly as to insure that some men shall not be given a lower rate by the union than the general run of members of the same capacity are receiving and are required to demand. It is difficult, too, to insure that men of lower grades shall be transferred to a higher grade when their competency rises above that of their grade. The unions consider it a further objection that the maintenance of a rate or rates below the point at which a single minimum would be set makes for the retention in the trade of a class of inefficient or partially trained workmen. . . .

Rate grouping in practice. Yet at least two unions in the building trades - the Lathers and the Wood Carvers - still accept it as an unobjectionable method of wage regulation. . . . Local unions in other trades have occasionally found it good policy to divide their members into two or three classes according to competency. When a union is first established in a locality or when a large plant is unionized the local union may find the new members grouped into two or three or even more fairly distinct wage classes. If the members have been working under the piece system there may be a considerable divergence in wages, particularly if the work is not highly-skilled. Under these circumstances it is difficult to find one rate that will be satisfactory as a minimum. The adoption of a single minimum if high would exclude the less capable men, and probably make it impossible to secure a wage agreement with the employer; a single low minimum would not be of much support to the men of higher earning capacity. Rather than take either of these courses local unions have in many cases preferred to establish two or three rates of wages. In such cases, however, the local union expects to eliminate the lower rate as soon as possible, and it is usually urged to do this by the national union. . . .