TENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BOARD OF MEDIATION AND ARBITRATION OF NEW YORK. Tenth Annual Report of the Board of Mediation and Arbitration of the State of New York. Transmitted to the Legislature January 28, 1897. Charles L. Phipps, William Purcell, and W. H. H. Webster, Commissioners. 589 pp. This report, like those for preceding years, contains accounts of individual labor disputes, arranged alphabetically according to industries, and verbatim reports of proceedings of the board where sessions were held for the purpose of taking testimony. An appendix contains a reproduction of arbitration laws in the various States. During the year ending October 31, 1896, 246 labor disputes were reported. This was nearly 40 per cent less than in 1895, and far below the average number in previous years. This decrease is attributed mainly "to the continuance of the business depression and consequent increase in the percentage of unemployed," and to some extent "to conservative action on the part of workingmen, who have learned from experience that the strike is a weapon to be used only as a last resort." Eighteen principal cases are cited where the board exercised its power of mediation. The 246 strikes and lockouts in the State were distributed among the following occupations: STRIKES AND LOCKOUTS IN NEW YORK, BY OCCUPATIONS, 1896. Of the 246 strikes and lockouts, 153, or 62 per cent, occurred in the city of New York, Brooklyn had 26, Buffalo 21, New York and Brooklyn 9, Albany 7, Rochester 5, and the remaining 25 occurred in 20 other cities and towns throughout the State. RECENT FOREIGN STATISTICAL PUBLICATIONS. GREAT BRITAIN. Ninth Report on Trade Unions in Great Britain and Ireland, 1896. lviii, 274 pp. (Published by the Labor Department of the British Board of Trade.) The information contained in this report on trade unions is presented under the following heads: Introduction and analysis and summary of tables; a detailed table showing, for each of 1,330 trade unions making returns, the date of formation of the union, the number of branches at the end of 1896, the membership for each of the five years 1892 to 1896, and the address of the chief office; a table showing details of funds, contributions, and expenditures for each of 100 selected trade unions in 1896; a comparative table showing the income and expenditure of the 100 unions for the five years 1892 to 1896 and another showing for the seven years 1890 to 1896 the amount of funds, contributions, and expenditures per member for the same 100 unions; also tables dealing with federations and trade councils, and mortality among trade unionists. The number of trade unions making returns for 1896 was 1,330, with 12,807 branches and 1,487,562 members. Of the 1,330 unions, 581, with a total membership of 1,094,345, were registered under the trade union act. The remaining 749, with a total membership of 393,217, were unregistered. The bulk of the trade union membership was furnished by a small number of large unions. Thus, there were 30 unions which had a membership of over 10,000 each and an aggregate membership of 718,050, while there were 489 unions of less than 100 members each, or an aggregate of but 24,728 members. About 83 per cent of the unions had a membership of less than 1,000, while their aggregate number of members was only 14 per cent of the total membership of all the trade unions. A new feature of the present report is the separate statement of the number of women belonging to trade unions in each group of industries. Of the total trade unions reporting, 127 had female members with ar aggregate female membership of 108,578. Of these unions, 107 had a mixed membership, and the remaining 20 unions, with a total of 6,974 persons, consisted entirely of women. The table following shows the number and membership of trade unions, by groups of industries, for the five years 1892 to 1896. NUMBER AND MEMBERSHIP OF TRADE UNIONS, BY GROUPS OF INDUSTRIES, 1892 TO 1896. [For this report special inquiries were made with regard to the membership of trade unions for the five years 1992 to 1896. The result, while completely revising the figures published in previous reports, affords a much more complete and accurate comparison of trade-union membership for a period of years than has hitherto been available.] Total 1, 1841, 239 1,285 1,316 1,330 1, 461, 800 1,453, 692 1, 424, 9411,397, 887 1,487, 562 a By the term "engineering" is meant such occupations as machinists, machine builders, turners, pattern makers, etc. It will be observed from the above table that there was a steady increase in the number of trade unions from 1,184 in 1892 to 1,330 in 1896. The trade-union membership shows a decrease from year to year until 1895, when the lowest figure, 1,397,887, was reached. In 1896 the number of members had increased to 1,487,562, the highest tradeunion membership during the period. The greatest proportional increase of membership during the fiveyear period occurred in the building trades, while the greatest decrease is noted in the group of agricultural labor and fisheries. Of the nine specified groups of industries given above, five show an increase and four a decrease of membership. The greatest membership in 1896, 301,506 persons, was reported by the group of metal, engineering, and shipbuilding. Next in order were the groups of mining and quarrying with 284,806, and of textiles with 212,491 members. The smallest membership was reported for the group of agricultural labor and fisheries. The financial details of the trade unions are given for only 100 of the leading societies. These, however, in 1896, represented 65 per cent of the total trade union membership reported. The following comparative statement shows the financial operations of the 100 principal trade-unions for the five years 1892 to 1896: FINANCIAL OPERATIONS OF 100 PRINCIPAL TRADE UNIONS, 1892 TO 1890. While the income of the trade unions was fairly stable during the five years, there was a considerable fluctuation of the annual expendi ture. In all the years, except 1893, the total expenditure was less than the total income, so that the accumulated funds have correspondingly increased. The annual expenditure was greatest, £1,858,300 ($9,043,417), in 1893 and least, £1,239,230 ($6,030,713), in 1896. The chief general features to be noted in a detailed comparison of expenditure over a period of years are the steady and continuous growth of expenditure on superannuation; the comparatively uniform cost per head for sickness, accident, and funeral benefits; and the marked variations in the expenditure on disputes. These points are brought out in the following comparative table: EXPENDITURES OF 100 PRINCIPAL TRADE UNIONS ON VARIOUS BENEFITS, ETC., 1892 TO 1896. [The expenditure per member is calculated throughout on the basis of the total membership of the 100 principal trade unions and not on the membership of the unions paying the particular classes of benefits.] 1.90 2,894, 477 3. 15 cident benefit Unemployed $1,702, 501 $1.87 $2, 234, 984 $2.44 $2, 254, 099 $2.42 $2, 132, 573 $2.32 $1, 388, 301 $1.43 1,739, 224 772, 367 83 926, 645 1.00 754, 930 78 Superannua tion benefit Funeral ben The expenditure for unemployed and dispute benefits reached its highest point, £1,054,035 ($5,129,461), in 1893, since which time this kind of expenditure has almost steadily decreased. Comparing 1896 with the preceding year, it is found that there was a decrease of nearly 35 per cent in the expenditure for the unemployed, and of 18.5 per cent for dispute benefits. The other expenditures varied but slightly during the five years. In general, there was a decreasing tendency in expendi tures for unemployed and dispute benefits, and an increasing tendency in expenditures for other friendly benefits. In 1896, for the first time. during the period, the expenditures for sick and accident, superannuation, and funeral benefits exceeded those for disputes and for the unemployed. In 1896 each group of industries showed a decrease in expenditure for unemployed benefits as compared with the preceding year. 4584-No. 16—10 Other forms of labor organization enumerated in this report are the federations and trade councils. A "federation" is defined as "an association of separate trade societies or branches of societies connected with kindred trades for certain limited and specific purposes, with limited and defined powers over its constituent societies." The trade councils are "purely local consultative bodies, to which their constituent societies send representatives for the purpose of discussion and advice.” The following summary shows the distribution of federations according to groups of industries and the trade councils for the years 1894, 1895, and 1896: FEDERATIONS OF TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE COUNCILS, 1894 TO 1896. The aggregate membership given in the table does not represent an equal number of separate individuals, since in some cases the same union belongs to more than one federation, and it often happens that local branches of unions are affiliated to local federations for certain purposes, while for other purposes the entire union belongs to some general federation. This duplication occurs mainly in the mining and building trades. The number of federations reported increased from 119 in 1895 to 130 in 1896, and the membership of affiliated unions and branches. from 1,116,962 to 1,141,318. ITALY. Statistica degli Scioperi avvenuti nell'Industria e nell' Agricoltura durante l'anno 1896. Ministero di Agricoltura, Industria e Commercio, Direzione Generale della Statistica. 1898. 88 pp. This report on strikes and lockouts in Italy during the year 1896 is published by the bureau of statistics of the Italian department of agriculture, industry, and commerce. The statistics cover disputes in the various branches of industry and among agricultural laborers. During the year 1896 the bureau received notice of 210 strikes, in which 96,051 persons took part, or an average of 457 per strike. These figures are greater than those for any year since the beginning of the period (1879) during which strike data have been published. The |