What a glaring misconception of the whole economic and social problem is here involved will appear if we add a clause or two to Mr. Kohler’s sentence.  He should have said:  “We can rely upon no one else to build our houses, railroads and subways, and mine our ores for us at $455 a year; for workers of native birth but of foreign fathers would cost us $566, and native born White Americans $666 a year.” (See Abstracts of Rep. of Immigr.  Comm. vol. i., pp. 405-8.) These are the facts.  This is the social situation as it should be stated if a candid discussion of the problem is sought.

Now what are the economic arguments for restricting somewhat the tide of immigration?  Several studies of standards of living among American workingmen within the past ten years have shown that a large proportion of American wage earners fall below a minimum efficiency standard.  Studies of American wages indicate that only a little over ten per cent of American wage earners receive enough to maintain an average family in full social efficiency.  The average daily wage for the year ranges from $1.50 to $2.  One-half of all American wage earners get less than $600 a year; three-quarters less than $750; only one-tenth more than $1,000.

Take in connection with these wage figures the statistics for unemployment.  The proportion of idleness to work ranges from one-third in mining industries to one-fifth in other industries.  In Massachusetts, 1908, manufacturers were unemployed twelve per cent of the working time.  Professor Streightoff estimated three years ago that the average annual loss in this country through unemployment is 1,000,000 years of working time.  Perhaps one-tenth of working time might be taken as a very conservative general average loss.  But the worst feature of the whole problem is that, in certain industries at least, the tendency to seasonal unemployment is increasing.  Ex-Commissioner Neill in his report on the Lawrence strike said:  “... it is a fact that the tendency in many lines of industry, including textiles, is to become more and more seasonal and to build to meet maximum demands and competitive trade conditions more effectively.  This necessarily brings it about that a large number of employes are required for the industry during its period of maximum activity who are accordingly of necessity left idle during the period of slackness.” (Senate Document 870, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912.)

If we recall still further that the casual laborer, who suffers most from seasonal unemployment, is the chief stumbling block in the way to a solution of the problem of poverty; that he furnishes the human power in “sweated trades:”  that immigrants form the majority of unskilled and sweated laborers; if we remember that there is not a shred of evidence (except the well-meant enthusiasm of the protagonists of the immigrant) to show that immigration has “forced-up” the American laborer and his standard of living, instead