Excerpt from The History and Problems of Organized Labor Preceding the nineteenth century and the use of natural power and machinery, leisure and comfort were considered to be the birthright of only a few. Hard and almost continuous toil on the part of the multitude was necessary to eke out an existence. With the enormous increase in the productive capacity of the world has come the possibility of a shorter working day and of a rising standard of living for the mass of toilers. Modern unionism has for its direct aim the betterment of working conditions; and such betterment has been made pos sible through the technical advances consummated during recent generations. The first unions were exclusive and monopolis tic; they aimed to raise a few workers in a given trade. The present tendency is toward more inclusive organization, in order to secure for labor as a class a portion of the benefits of indus trial progress. NO wide-spread and inclusive labor organiza tion could exist until the long era of scarcity was succeeded by one in which a sufficiency is possible for all. Labor organiza tions do not become important factors in the community until after the problems centering around the distribution of wealth, rather than around the production of wealth, become of fore most importance. In a democracy, modern labor unions may utilize two forms of activity in order to accomplish their pur poses, - purely economic and political. Up to the present time, the chief reliance of the unionists has been placed upon the purely economic activities. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.