The effect of such a
policy would be of course to enormously strengthen the effective power
of labour-organizations. But while the advocates of public workshops are
fully alive to these economic effects, they have not worked out with
equal clearness the question relating to the disposal of the labour in
public workshops. How can the "protected" labour of the public workshops
be so occupied, that its produce may not, by direct or indirect
competition with the produce of outside labour, outweigh the advantage
conferred upon the latter by the removal of the "unemployed" from the
field of competition, in digging holes and filling them up again, or
other useless work, the problem is a simple one. In that case the State
provides maintenance for the weaker members in order that their presence
as competitors for work may not injure the stronger members. But if the
public workmen produce anything of value, by what means can it be kept
from competing with and underselling the goods produced under ordinary
commercial conditions? Without alleging that the difficulties involved
in these questions are necessarily fatal to all schemes of public works,
we maintain that they require to be clearly faced.
Even if it be held that public workshops can furnish no economic remedy
for poverty, this judgment would of course be by no means conclusive
against public emergency works undertaken on charitable grounds to tide
over a crisis.
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