TOO LONG HOURS?
Stn,—Your opinion that "the only remedy (for our overall insufficiency of production) is an increase in the duration and intensity of work" is, I think, mistaken. After so much war-weariness, which, I might say in passing, is the principal cause of these unofficial strikes, working harder and working longer have become contradictions in terms. If there were any doubt of my assertion, surely our experience towards the end of 5940 would be sufficient warning, when firms found themselves producing as much per week at reduced hours as they had been doing after three or four months of 70 or 80 hours per week. To ask men to work longer now would be fertile for ill-feeling, absenteeism, slower work and paper money—that is to say money paid out without an increased quantity of goods to balance it.—Yours, &c., DION MURRAY. 6 Airedale Avenue, Chiswick, W. 4.
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