The Downside in Division of Labor

1st, It tends to enervate the laborer, because it does not, as a general fact, give full activity and development to all the functions of the body.
We shall proceed to show that this is true of those classes who perform what we have designated as material labor, while the very distinction of mental labor implies such a separation between the natural functions as seems not to consist with the best physical condition of those engaged. Common observation will affirm that this is strikingly true. It is not necessary, but the tendency exists.
In the material occupations, it is found that confinement to a single operation is often highly injurious. There are forms of labor which sufficiently exercise the several parts of the body. The mere fact of uniformity of motion brings no objection to such as these. But there are those which require the constant fatiguing use of some member, to the injury of the rest of the body; others require a cramping posture that oppresses and disorders the vital organs; others still require the workman to poison his blood with unwholesome gases. In the great centres of capital and labor, — whether we regard the mill, or that larger mill, the city itself, — it is notorious that distortion, paralysis, and organic feebleness, are more common than where labor is diffused, and the laborer changes his work and his place frequently.
That this will occur in the course of all manufacturing industry is probable. That it is inevitable does not so clearly appear. The sanitary arts keep even pace with the advance of machinery. The civil war in America developed astonishingly the resources, which are at the command of government, to suppress malaria, and reform the habitations of disease. The growth of manly sports, and the cultivation of gymnastics for health's sake, are likely to work a great change for the better in the sanitary conditions of our people. The intelligent precaution of operatives in every country, where their remuneration is any thing less than robbery, can guard against all excessive derangement of the bodily functions.
It is perhaps significant to the question whether the application of the bodily powers to a single continuous action is really in practice injurious, that we find in the statistics of Massachusetts, ranging over sixteen years, the average life of " laborers having no special trades " to be less by two years than that of " active mechanics in shops."
Mechanical operations were formerly considered as disqualifying for military service; and even our modern philosophy has found in them a reason for the employment of mercenaries, and the maintenance of standing armies. But the great civil war just referred to exhibited the novel fact, that, beyond all dispute, the troops raised in agricultural districts are not so hardy in the privations and exposures of camp and field as those coming from the towns. This does not, however, imply a better state of health at home. It may be, that the latter class find, in the constant exercise and the out-door employment, just that change of habit and condition which they needed. All that is different from their usual course of life is in the direction of more air and light and motion; while the agricultural laborers find no change except for the worse. They have been accustomed to active employment; but the harsh necessities of the service come to them fresh and strong. It is perhaps the direction of influences more than the degree of them which determines these matters of health; or it may be, that mechanical occupations, contrary to general opinion and in spite of some plain drawbacks, do tend to compact the frame and the sinew, and lend force and vitality to the organs. Whatever the explanation, we will rest with the fact, that, in the severe trial of strength and endurance made by the war, the mechanical occupations have not been discredited.
2d, This system, in some of its applications and in certain degrees of extension, does not give that full employment and expansion to all the powers of the mind which its normal development requires. This is obvious. The mind, if intensely devoted for a whole life to a single effort, and that perhaps of the most simple kind, cannot but be unfavorably affected. Unless counteracting influences are resorted to, it will undoubtedly be contracted and enervated.
To this liability are opposed three compensations: —
a. The great communicativeness observable in such circumstances, the eager discussions, the free inquiry, the school, and the lyceum.
b. The saving principle that the employment of one member is, to a certain extent, the employment of all. The human faculties, mental and physical, are a knot. They interpenetrate so completely that it is impossible to move one without affecting the rest. If we compare the mind to a reservoir, we may say that the individual powers and dispositions flow out of it as so many streams; but there is nothing to prevent them from flowing back, if the level is sufficiently disturbed. The special use of one may develop it greatly; make it more strong and active than the others. But such a predominance is not distortion. Few minds are capable of even and temperate growth. In this principle resides the variety of human character. It may be questioned whether any but the most gifted can be educated in any other way so thoroughly and efficiently as by interested application to some single matter. Generalization and broad philosophy rouse the full powers of but few intellects. In the majority of cases, it will remain true that intense, spirited, persistent labor directed to one point is better than the languid, nerveless, unspurred, rambling play of all the faculties. Mind, to be energetic, must not be republican. The powers must be centralized. Some must be despotic.
Indeed, the argument against division of labor on this score would be better expressed by saying, that the constant repetition of single acts so far dispenses with thought, and even with consciousness, in the operation, that it makes man, in some sense, a machine. This is, to a considerable extent, true; the compensation being that it affords a greater opportunity for discussion and reflection, if the workman chooses to avail himself of the kind of mental leisure which is afforded by the monotony of his occupation. It is, therefore, not the excessive use, but the disuse, of the intellectual faculties, that is to be feared in those arts to which labor has been carried to its fullest division.
The Disadvantages Of The Division of Labor. Part 2
c. The laborer is not all workman. While his special occupation provides for his subsistence, and endows him with energy, industry, and concentrativeness of mind and character, he has other hours and other duties, ample, if reasonably used, to compensate for all the evil mental effects of his continuous toil.
It will be observed, that it is only to the division of labor beyond a certain point, that the objections we have discussed have any application. A more ill-developed society, with more ill-developed members, could not be conceived than where this principle was not applied at all. In fact, there could be neither members nor society; but here and there a savage would bask in the summer sun, or hide himself in the storms of winter, in hopeless, helpless barbarism.
However we may speculate, a priori, on the consequences of dividing minutely the parts of labor, we may perhaps get a stronger light and a better view by observing the mightiest experiment of industry ever known in the world, — that of England to-day. Nowhere are the natural advantages of agriculture more apparant; nowhere has manufacturing been more elaborated. Yet no person can be cognizant of the condition of the English population, without being assured that the manufacturing, laboring class is almost immeasurably above the agricultural in intelligence, in independence of character, and obedience to law. Probably the most conservative nobleman of the realm would admit that the former class is far better qualified for the franchise than the latter.
3d, It will follow, from what has been already urged, that division of labor, in its greatest extension, has a tendency, or at least there is found in it a liability, to lower the average of health, to shorten life, and prevent the natural increase of population.
All these results are found, on examination, more or less, but still above the general facts of the country, in all the great centres of manufacturing industry, where the full possibilities of the mechanic arts are realized by the intense subdivision of labor. This result can only be partially and confusedly shown by statistics: still enough can be extracted to assure us that there is a great loss of vital energy, whether or not it is necessary to such a state of industry.
The American average of life may be expressed nearly as follows: * —
Cultivators of the earth...... 64 years.
Active mechanics out of shops .... 50 „
Active mechanics in shops..... 47½ „
Inactive mechanics in shops..... 413/4 „
Laborers, no special trades..... 45½ „
These statistics, accurately gathered and showing the results of many years, require " correction " in several particulars, if the real lesson of them is to be obtained. In the first place, two-thirds of the Class of mechanics as presented here are engaged in such occupations as do not allow any very extended subdivision of the parts, so that the average of the great manufacturing establishments and their dependent cities would be found still more striking. In the second place, the agricultural occupations are continually making contribution to manufacturers of their best blood and bone, renewing the natural waste of the mill and shop, and so interfering with the statistics of the subject. This element can neither be eliminated nor determined. We shall rest satisfied with knowing it is there. So important is it at times, that Lowell appears on the tables as one of the healthiest cities of America. It is unquestionably true that much of the historical feebleness and mortality of such places has been avoided by more humane and intelligent precautions, by gymnastic sports and out-door games, and by a better adaptation of all the conditions of production to the necessities of life and well-being. But the great fact which accounts for this seeming healthfulness of a manufacturing city is the constant infusion of the fresh, vigorous, young blood of the country.
* Massachusetts Registration of Births, Deaths, and Marriages.
It is not necessarily a disadvantage in this respect, that manufactures, in their greatest centralization, prevent the full natural increase of population. Indeed, it is a beneficent provision of Nature which checks propagation in precisely those circumstances where the offspring is less likely to receive that nourishment and care and exercise which shall secure its best development. Far from being a misfortune, it is well that those who are to live in the cities should be born in the.country, and get size and strength on the hills and in the open air. This tendency does not go so far as to deprive the dwellers in the cities, and the workers in brass and wool, of the cares and the pleasures and the culture of paternity. Yet the law that men shall be •born upon the land is as clear in history, and in our common observation, as any fiat of Nature.
The Disadvantages Of The Division of Labor. Part 3
4th, The division of labor lessens the number of those who do business on their own account. This is a natural consequence of what has been shown. We have said that capital has a tendency toward concentration; and, if it be aggregated, labor must also be. The result of this, in agriculture, is to absorb the yeomanry into the class of those who labor by the day or month, with no interest in the land. The result in manufacturing is to subordinate hundreds of operatives to the control of a single will. This has a threefold relation: a. To the formation of character. Something of independence and self-respect is unquestionably lost, so far as these depend on external conditions. Position and responsibility do foster and strengthen manliness and self-mastery. By the division of labor, the independence of each is sacrificed to the good of all. It will not be doubted, that, on the whole, it is desirable that it should be so ; nor can it be denied that there are partial drawbacks, even in this plain tendency of civilization. It is the sacrifice man has to make in society, in industry, in government. b. To the fairness of remuneration. A very few now participate in the profits. The great bulk of workmen receive only wages, and that on temporary engagements. This disproportion may be excessive, and is likely to bo where laws or institutions check enterprise, and discourage individual effort. In such cases, laborers are practically a herd of cattle, driven about from place to place, receiving bare subsistence, and unable to mend their condition. This is a lamentable state of things; an abuse of a good principle. No one can deny, however, that the worst-treated operatives of the civilized world receive infinitely more than if the efforts of men were all individual and independent, and each was left to satisfy his wants from the primitive resources of Nature. But, even if we come forward from the barbarous state to that in which the work of man has divided itself into numerous trades, each of these, however, yet remaining distinct, and compare this with the present state, in which trades have been repeatedly subdivided, — capital aggregate and labor subordinate,— we shall yet find that the share of the poorest laborer in the mighty product of our industry of to-day is greater than ever before. Augustus, says Arbuthnot, had neither glass to his windows nor a shirt to his back.
Thus much could be urged of the wretchedest operatives on the earth; but, when we regard the condition of labor as it exists in nearly all the countries of the world, we shall quickly confess, that, though the laborer has given up his share of profits, he receives back, as wages, far more objects of desire than he could have obtained in the old way. c. To the steadiness of employment. By the attraction of labor to great centres, the fate of many laborers is made dependent on that of a few capitalists. This is a great fact, scientifically and historically. It must continue. It has issued, in the past, in the form of great industrial distresses, of a general suspension of mechanical labor from causes affecting only the mercantile credit of the employers, of frantic appeals for support, of laws in which government assumes the duty of providing work for its whole population, of riots and revolution. So far as this will occur in spite of prudence and careful management, it is the condition on which we have the advantages of division of labor. Men cannot cross the great ocean alone. They must go together, have help of each other,. and embark their fortunes on a common bottom. More of them would perhaps be safe if each was on a ship of his own; but that cannot well be.
Even in regard to steadiness of employment, the aggregation of capital and consequent division of labor assist the workman up to a certain point. That point is the great catastrophe which no structure can withstand. Then, the greater the structure, the more completely it crushes the laborer.
Where capital is concentrated, it is stronger, protects itself better; and, of course, the workman shares in this power and immunity. Where the industry of thousands is controlled by the mind of one, it will be more intelligently and harmoniously administered, and with a larger view of the business. By such superiority of union in production (for that is synonymous with division of labor), the industry of a country is lifted clean over obstacles which individual enterprise could not pass,—is preserved amid storms that would shatter the feeble fabric of single hands. Industry in masses, when it receives a shock, can hold on to the accumulations of the past and to the credit of the future, and so stands firm.
But when the blow becomes so heavy as to shatter even the great workshops of modern industry, and they come down, then truly the fall is great. The ruin is more complete than if the storm had prostrated a village of huts. The reservoir of gathered power has burst; the springs have long since been broken down; the wells been filled up; and there is no supply for immediate wants. Such a loss is repaired slowly. The trampled grass raises itself, and looks up again; but the oak lies as it falls. Independent has been discouraged by collective industry; the shop has been abandoned for the mill; each workman has learned only the fraction of a trade; no one can buy, make, and sell; no one dares to undertake any business, foreseeing that the corporation must rise again. For a while, all is distress. It is only when the stately fabric of associated industry is reared again, that plenty is known in the land.
We have discussed, somewhat at length, the relations which division of labor holds to the condition of the laborer, by depriving him of the opportunity to do business on his own account. Until recently, it has been supposed that the advantages of the principle could not practically be obtained without this defect; that capital could not be concentrated, and the trades perfected, without diminishing the independence and self-reliance of labor. But recent developments seem to be anticipating the objection. It is now a matter of common practice to admit the laborer to an interest in business, — a share in profits. This is done by merchants to their salesmen, by master mechanics to their workmen, by ship-owners to their hands. All stock-companies, of whatever character, admit of this principle. Mutual industrial associations for trade, mining, and insurance, furnish its most significant and hopeful applications. There is no reason why these should not be extended much further by a gradual growth, as they are found convenient and profitable. Just so far as a sufficient spring of self-interest can be maintained in the effort, both of the employer, or manager, and of the operative, so far may mutuality of profits be applied to all departments with the most beneficial results.