TRADE - UNION TYRANNY.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."
Sin,—In view of the present condition of things in the industrial world the accompanying extract from Mr. Price Collier's able book, "The West in the East," is of interest. It is a formidable indictment, but many people will agree in thinking that unless something can be done to check the growing tyranny of the trade unions it is only too likely to prove true. It would be interesting to know your views on the
" Great Britain has the highest, the most costly, and the most pernicious tariff in the world in its trades unions, which put a tax on every labourer's time and every labourer's hand and arm. Men are only allowed to work so many hours and to produce so much. This is the tariff which is ruining England slowly but surely. America is really a Free Trade country as compared with my delightfully dull friend John Bull, who goes to the extreme length of taxing time and taxing energy, thus adding enormously to the cost price of everything he sells, and thus building a tariff wall against his own workmen in their attempts to compete with the foreigner."—" The West in the East," p. 23.
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