Payroll

“ In fixing compensation to be paid to persons under the classified civil service, the Board of Supervisors shall, in each instance, provide a salary or wage at least equal to the prevailing salary or wage for the same quality of service rendered to private persons, firms or corporations under similar employment in case such prevailing salary or wage can be ascertained. ”

“ Two months salary to you two officers amounts altogether to $2,400—about one-eighth of your ten per cent. assessment, you see; which leaves you in debt to the company for the other seven-eighths of the assessment—viz, something over $8,000 apiece. Now instead of requiring you to forward this aggregate of $16,000 or $17,000 to New York, the company voted unanimously to let you pay it over to the contractors, laborers from time to time, and give you credit on the books for it. ”

“ Each land agent and labourer being a Retainer of the Company shall receive and be paid a fixed salary in return for his services and shall not by perquisites commissions or any other means whatever either directly or indirectly receive or acquire any pay profit emolument or advantages whatever other than such fixed salary from out of or by means of his office or position as a Retainer of the Company. ”

“ Any shopkeeper, dealer, or trader, who by way of trade makes any arrangement express or implied with any worker in pursuance of which the worker performs any work for which a minimum rate of wages has been fixed under this Act, shall be deemed for the purposes of this Act to be the employer of the worker, and the net remuneration obtainable by the worker in respect of the work after allowing for his necessary expenditure in connection with the work shall be I deemed to be wages. ”

“ It is important that every person employed in the establishment, whatever might be the amount paid for his services, whether he act as labourer or porter, as the clerk who keeps the accounts, or as book-keeper employed for a few hours once a week to superintend them, should receive one half of what his service is worth in fixed salary, the other part varying with the success of the undertaking. ”

“ Paid sometimes by the day, oftener by the week or month, occasionally by the year, and in many branches of production by the piece, the payment of wages by an employer to an employee always implies the previous rendering of labour by the employee for the benefit of the employer. ”

“ Wages defined.—Hence it is fair to define wages as a stipulated sum, paid at stipulated times, for stipulated services, measured either by the number of distinct services or by the time of service. A wage-earner must therefore be one who sells his powers, whatever they may be, for the use of another, bringing his own services rather than the products of those services to the best market he can find. ”

“ He will earn more in one month than the next, more in one quarter than the next. Seasonal variations in the business may result in a high total income for one quarter and a low total for the next. A discharged employee, who secures other employment at a normal and constant rate of income, may achieve a yearly rate of pay substantially equal to that of his regular job. That apparently is this case. If, therefore, back pay is computed in this case on a quarterly basis, the employee will probably receive an award in excess of the amount of income he would have earned had he not been discharged. ”

“ The strain of responsibility increases in some degree with the number of operative laborers employed, and successful oversight of many hands may be essential to their profitable employment. In that case the salary of the overseer gains something of the nature of profits, since the manager gauges the pay by profits expected. If, as in great stock companies, a manager is hired at a stipulated salary, his personal abilities, as tested by accomplishment, are likely to be the sole [pg 244] gauge of wages. ”

“ Under the wage contract the employer, as the one best prepared to do it, takes the risk as to the future selling price of the product; the worker gets in a definite sum at once the market value of his services. Wage payment, therefore, is a form of insurance to the workingman; he gets something definite instead of taking chances he is ill prepared to take. Wage payment is a form of credit to the laborer whose labor is applied to producing the goods for customers distant in time and in place. ”

“ The labourer is paid by his employer a wage which represents the ‘exchange value’ of his ‘labour-force.’ But the employer has obtained the ‘use-value’ of the labour-force, and disposes of the newly-created product in the market at a selling price which, after making allowance for the costs of production before and after the application of labour-force, is higher than the wage paid to the labourer. ”

“ Payments by employers into employees’ funds.—Payments made by an employer into a stock bonus, pension, or profit-sharing fund constitute wages if such payments inure to the exclusive benefit of the employee and may be withdrawn by the employee at any time, or upon resignation or dismissal, or if the contract of employment requires such payment as part of the compensation. ”

“ A wage earner systematically producing less than the fixed standard may be transferred by decision of the proper valuation commission to other work in the same group and category, or to a lower group or category, with a corresponding reduction of wages.
Note. The wage earner may appeal from the decision to transfer him to a lower group or category with a reduction of wages, to the Local Department of Labor and from the decision of the latter to the District Department of Labor, whose decision shall be final and not subject to further appeal. ”

“ By the quarterly calculation approved by the Court in the instant case, not only may a wrongfully discharged employee often receive as back pay a greater amount than he would have received had he worked at his regular job, but the employer must pay more than he would have had to pay if he had had the employee's services during the period. ”

“ In their effort to reach an agreement here both the union and the company treated the company's ability to pay increased wages as highly relevant. The ability of an employer to increase wages without injury to his business is a commonly considered factor in wage negotiations. [4] Claims for increased wages have sometimes been abandoned because of an employer's unsatisfactory business condition; employees have even voted to accept wage decreases because of such conditions. ”

“ The funds were provided in equal contributions by employers and employed—the principle underlying the system being that of deferred wages. It was a question whether it was encouraging thrift to withhold from such wage-earners 2 per cent. of their wages. The State bore the cost of management, and added to every pension a bonus of £2 10s. a year. For the working of the system the wage-earners were divided into five grades: (1) Those who earn up to £17 10s. a year; (2) those who earn any sum between £17 10s. ”

“ It must be further remarked, that it is not a necessary consequence of joint stock management, that the persons employed, whether in superior or in subordinate offices, should be paid wholly by fixed salaries. There are modes of connecting more or less intimately the interest of the employés with the pecuniary success of the concern. There is a long series of intermediate positions, between working wholly on one's own account, and working by the day, week, or year for an invariable payment. ”

“ Where there are no overtime premium payments the rule for determining the regular rate of pay is to divide the wages actually paid by the hours actually worked in any workweek and adjudge additional payment to each individual on that basis for time in excess of forty hours worked for a single employer. ”

“ With organization which is local [Pg 454] only, and with collective bargaining that goes only to the extent of adjusting the pay of men in one establishment, this pay comes nearer to the standard set by the productivity of labor than it would if bargains were individually made. The employer balances in his mind the value of a new and raw force and the value of a selected and disciplined force, measures the difference between these values, and will often pay a rate that is between the two amounts and under average conditions is likely to approach the larger of them. ”

“ But if a single bargain is to determine the pay of a large number of men, there must be a common standard. In every employment on a large scale the men are necessarily grouped together and their pay is determined by a common rule. This is true even in non-union shops. It is generally assumed that the standard rate of labor organizations means a uniform wage for each member, but this is not the case ”

“ Every employer shall pay to each of his employees * * * (3) after the expiration of seven years * * * not less than 40 cents an hour, or the rate (not less than 30 cents an hour) prescribed in the applicable order of the Administrator issued under section 8, whichever is lower * * *.'↑ 'The committee shall recommend to the Administrator the highest minimum wage rates for the industry which it determines, having due regard to economic and competitive conditions, will not substantially curtail employment in the industry.' Section 8 (b) . ”

“ If the salary is fixed without any regard for that law, as, for instance, when I see two engineers leaving college together, both equally well trained and efficient, and one getting forty thousand while the other is satisfied with two; or when I see lawyers and hussars, having no special qualifications, appointed directors of banking companies with immense salaries, I conclude that the salary is not fixed in accordance with the law of supply and demand, but simply through personal interest. ”

“ Thus although the employer wishes to pay as little as possible, and the employee to receive as much as possible, wages will be fixed by the value of such labor to the laborers themselves. If wages are temporarily carried either above or below this line, a tendency to carry them back at once arises. ”

“ Over 60% of such companies paid some type of premium or gratuity to their wage earners for work performed on Sundays or holidays, the extra pay ranging from 25% to 100%, in addition to the regular rate of pay. ”

“ THE LABORERS RECEIVE WAGES.—The payment which the laborers receive for their part in the production of the shoes is called wages. Since the laborers help in shoe manufacture, the employer can afford to pay them. Not only can he afford to pay them, but he must pay them. Otherwise the laborers would not work for this particular entrepreneur, but, in a freely competitive market, would offer their services to a competing employer. ”

“ Such practices are recognized to be incidental to the employee's general employment and are given consideration in fixing the rate of pay for it. They are not in the nature of exactions of pay for something not performed or not to be performed. ”

“ Key and Sons, wholesale stationers in Abchurch-lane, Lombard-street, at a weekly salary of one guinea; which was more by half than I had received from my last employers, and equal to the pay of an experienced clerk in an attorney's office at that time of day. This situation I obtained through the interest of one of my fellow-rakes, the son of a substantial citizen, who roundly vouched for my integrity and diligent conduct. My employment here was to superintend the packing of goods for exportation and home consumption; to write invoices; copy letters; ship goods at the Custom-house, &c. ”

“ From the standpoint of the employer, the rate per unit should be based on the productiveness of the individual, and should insure to the most skillful, a wage as high as, or slightly higher than, he would receive under the day-wage plan. ”

“ If a servant misbehaved, they could authorize reduction of wage, discharge, and hard labor at a house of Correction up to one month. If a servant was not paid, he could authorize payment of wages up to 10 pounds for an agricultural servant, and up to 5 pounds for an artificer, handicraftsman, miner, collier, keelman, pitman, glassman, potter, or ordinary laborer. ”

“ The basic facts to be ascertained administratively are whether the prescribed wage as applied to an industry will substantially curtail employment, and whether to attain the legislative end there is need for wage differentials applicable to classes in industry. The factors to be considered in arriving at these determinations, both those specified and 'other relevant factors', are those which are relevant to or have a hearing on the statutory objective. ”

“ Twenty per cent. additional pay is allowed by the joint resolution of the twenty-eighth of February, 1867, to certain persons or classes of persons therein described, who are employed in the civil service of the United States in this city, whose salaries, as fixed by law, do not exceed three thousand five hundred dollars per annum, to be paid out of any money in the treasury not otherwise appropriated. ”

“ Wage awards for different industries and occupations should be constantly related to each other. The underlying emphasis in the whole series of awards for different industries and occupations should be that the wages of each group are what they are, more because the total wage income is what it is than because of the special type of work performed by any group. The same wage should be paid throughout industry for different 273 kinds of work which require approximately the same human qualities and which make approximately the same demands upon the individual. ”