§ 6. Pressure of immigration upon native wage workers. There must always have been cases where the labor incomes of workers were somewhat depressed by the incoming of im migrants. Indeed, that must to some extent always be so when the natives continue to work alongside of the immigrant 8 See ch. 21, § 16, and references in note.
at just the same job. But before the Civil War living con ditions were simple, wages comparatively high and (more im portant) pretty steadily rising, and the wage-earning class not yet a large share of the population. Moreover, this con flict of interest was minimized and often quite avoided by the native changing to another occupation. In the old days there was always the outlet of free land on the frontier, now closed. Always there has been a better opportunity for natives to move into higher positions of foremanship or as employers of immigrant labor.
As the wage-earners have become relatively a more numer ous, and permanent class in the United States, many of them have felt more keenly the pressure of competition from immi grant labor. Moreover, the immigration since 1890 has been increasingly from southern and southeastern Europe, from countries with much lower standards of living, and has been of enormous proportions. Here are some significant figures as to immigration since 1820: In interpretating these 'figures it should be observed, how ever, that in the last two decades many immigrants from southern and eastern Europe have been returning to their native lands. The net addition to population due to im migration in this period, therefore, has been considerably less than the figures in the table indicate. Before this century the return flow of migration was very small.
§ 7. Abnormal labor conditions resulting from immigra tion. The labor supply coming from countries of denser population and with low standards of living creates, in some occupations, an abnormally low level of wages and priced. Children cannot be born in American homes and raised on the American standard of living cheaply enough to maintain at such low wages a continuous supply of laborers. Many industries and branches of industry in America are thus para sitical. A condition essentially pathological has come to be looked upon as normal. The commercial ideal imposes itself upon the minds of men in other circles.
Statistics show that the prevailing wages for unskilled man ual workers in America rose much less in the half century after the Civil War than did other wages.* Wages in the great lower strata of the unskilled and slightly skilled workers are much lower in America relative to those of more skilled and professional workers than they are in Europe. It can hardly be doubted that the most important, though not the sole, cause of this situation has been the unceasing inflow of immigrants See below, see. 12.
going into these low-paid occupations. The "general eco nomic situation" in America, but for immigration, would com pel higher wages to be paid to the masses of the workers. If
immigration were suddenly stopped in a period of normal or of increasing business, wages in these occupations would at once rise, and that without the aid of organization, of strikes, or of arbitration. This would affect most those oc cupations which now present the most serious social prob lems, in mines, factories, and city sweatshops. In some small measure the war in the Balkan States, by recalling many men for service, had this influence in 1912; and the great war beginning in 1914, by stopping a large part of the usual im migration, gave a striking demonstration of this principle. In employing circles the rise of wages was sometimes referred to with an air of grievance as due to the "monopoly of labor," as if the economic situation here, enabling the wage-earners (millions of them immigrants) to get a higher competitive wage when immigration temporarily was diminished, consti tuted a monopoly.