small as compared with the entire amount of service income. Thus on the railroads the total compensation of both general and other officers was $40,000,000 in 1911. This constituted only about 3 per cent, of the total compensation paid during the year to all classes of employees. If to the salaries of all officers are added the total salaries of office clerks[1] the entire salary schedule for the railroads covers 8 per cent, of the total amount paid in compensation.[2] The same situation exists in street railways. All street and electric railway salaries amount to approximately $13,000,000, which is 9 per cent, of the total amount paid for compensation.[3] The Census reports[4] the payment of $4,366,000,000 for services in the manufacturing industries. Of this amount, $939,000,000, or more than a fifth, was expended for salaries. Officers of corporations received a quarter of this salary expenditure; superintendents and managers another quarter, and clerks and other subordinate employees received a half. If individual industries are examined, however, it appears that in highly organized businesses like the production of iron and steel, of railroad cars and locomotives, of agricultural implements, and the like, the relation of salaries to total compensation is essentially the same as that for railroads. The figures for mines and quarries[5] show $40,000,000 paid in all kinds of salaries, as compared with $370,000,000 paid in wages. Again the figures appear as about 10 per cent. General officers received one fifth of the forty millions, or about 2 per cent, of the whole; superintendents, managers and foremen received three fifths, and clerks one fifth of the total salary expenditure. For those industries in which figures are available, it would seem that the general officers receive less than one twentieth of the total amount paid in compensation, while all salaried persons (general officers, other officers and clerks) receive about a tenth of the total payments in the form of compensation. This generalization holds true for large, highly organized industries. In the smaller, less specialized industries, the proportion which the salary account bears to the total payments for compensation is perhaps double that in the larger industries.
The figures furnish an indication of the manner in which service income is divided between those who receive salaries and those who receive wages. When a hundred dollars is paid in compensation by a
- ↑ This computation is made because of general usage by virtue of which clerks are paid by the month. Their yearly earnings are usually less than those of the better-paid wage-earners.
- ↑ Ibid., p. 29.
- ↑ "Street and Electric Railways," 1907, Special Report of the Census, Washington, Government Printing Office, 1910, p. 195.
- ↑ Thirteenth Census of the United States, Volume VIII., Washington, Government Printing Office, 1913, p. 129.
- ↑ "Mines and Quarries," 1902, Special Report of the United States, Washington, Government Printing Office, 1905, p. 91.
