THE INCREASE IN INDUSTRIAL REMUNERATION UNDER PROFIT-SHARING
In comection with the peculiar method of industrial remuneration known as Profit-sharing it is proposed to consider, by the light of such statistical information as it is practicable to obtain, one important point--the actual extent of the addition which the adoption of this method has made to the remuneration of labour. Before we investigate the figures, it is necessary to explain the sense in which the term 'Profit-sharing' is used by the present writer.
For the reasons stated, and in consonance with the authorities referred to by me in the Ecoomic Review (Jan., 1891, pp. 93-96), I define Profit-sharing 'to be an arrangement under which an employer agrees with his employees that they shall receive, in partial remuneration of their labour, and in addition to their ordinary wages, a share, fixed beforehand, in the profits of his business.'[1]
Tables I. and II. relate to Profit-sharing as at present practised in business concerns other than those 'co-operative' undertakings which are included in the Returns published by the Co-operative Union (the central organization of the working-men co-operators). Cases in which Profit-sharing has been abandoned, and cases in which a profit-sharing firm has gone into liquidation, or has for any other reason ceased to carry on business, are excluded from consideration.
The total number of British employers (other than societies included in the Co-operative Returns) known to me to practise Profit-sharing is forty-nine, of which forty-five have practised this method for one year or more. Tables I. and II. contain information as to thirty-five of these employers. In regard to four other firms
- ↑ It will be seen that this definition excludes cases (a) of 'indeterminate bonus,' (b) of 'bonus on output,' and (c) of dividends received by an employee-shareholder.
