employers will
naturally in face of a minimum wage retain in employment that quality of
worker that can give the maximum effort. Another difficulty is the
tendency for wages of all workers, regardless of their ability, to fall
to the minimum, for the employer naturally reduces the good to average
with the poor worker. I would not want to be understood to necessarily
oppose the possibilities of a minimum wage for women over large areas,
as distinguished from craft minimums for men, because certain social
questions enter that problem to an important degree.

There is another feature of the Kansas Act that should be given a great
deal of consideration, and that is its essential provision that in the
determination of wage disputes it shall be based on a fair profit to the
employer. This must ultimately lead to a determination as to what a fair
profit consists of, just as minimum wage will need be found for every
craft and every establishment. I do not assume that any employer will
contend for an unfair profit, but the termination of what may be a fair
or unfair profit in respect to the hazards involved in the institution
of a business, in its conduct over a long term of years, its necessary
provisions for its replacement and future disasters, is a matter that
has not yet been satisfactorily determined by either theoretic
economics, legislation, or courts. In competitive industry the processes
of business determine this matter every day, and owners will only claim
such determination by the State when the competitive tide is against
them. We have long since recognized the rights of the State to determine
maximum profits in case of a monopoly, but the determination of minimum
profits (for fair profit is a minimum as well as maximum) may deliver
large burdens to the people. Moreover, I doubt whether labor will
ultimately welcome such determination, for an unsuccessful plant,
instead of abandoning its production to its competitors, will claim wage
reductions from the courts, and the general level of wages can thus be
driven down and the State, at least morally, becomes a guarantor of
profits in overdeveloped industry. This plan in the long run substitutes
government control of industry for competition.

As to whether such acts will not tend to crush out initiative, credit,
and curtail the proper development of industry, can only be determined
with time. Generally, it should be clearly understood that compulsory
settlement of em