A rational wages system : $b some notes on the method of paying the worker a reward for efficiency in addition to wagesAtkinson, Henry
General
A rational wages system : $b some notes on the method of paying the worker a reward for efficiency in addition to wages
Atkinson, Henry
Incentives in industry -- Great Britain; Wages -- Great Britain
The wages of every worker who fails to reach an average efficiency of,
say, 85 per cent. during the previous three months will automatically
drop 1s. per week until he is on the lowest rate.
Under these conditions a worker on the lowest rate will try to reach
a higher one, and if he is on a higher rate he will always try to
maintain his efficiency. A drop in efficiency means a direct loss to
the worker, and the worker would probably complain of the conditions
of his work. If other workers can keep up their efficiencies on the
same jobs, the complaint is groundless; while if other workers cannot
keep their efficiencies, it is obvious that something is wrong, and the
conditions will be investigated.
The variation of the wages being automatic, no one can complain of
unfairness.
The advantage of making the change every three months instead of a
longer period would mean that every worker would take a live interest
in his continuous efficiency, and would not be content with a good week
one week and a medium week the next. And, again, a good man who dropped
down owing to unforeseen circumstances would only be down for three
months, while a medium worker would always respond to the incentive,
and when he reached another step up he would make great efforts not to
go down again.
There would be an automatic selection of the best men, and favouritism
would be reduced to almost nothing. A foreman could not prevent a man
getting the increase when his efficiency proved that he had earned it,
and he could not push on an inferior man because of personal friendship.
Should a high wage man leave, then he would have to come back on the
lowest wage rate if he wanted to come back. This would induce men to
keep their situations. Should a man be discharged, the same thing would
happen. But a high wage man is of far more value to a firm than a low
wage man, and he would not be discharged unless discharged permanently
for some fault.
If a firm thought to lower wages by discharging all the high efficiency
men, and then take them on again at a lower wage, that firm would
immediately lose caste, and no high efficiency man would work there. A
high efficiency man can get a job anywhere.
This floating wage rate would be quite apart from the question of
reward, and the job rates for reward work would be the same for all
workers no matter what their wage rate was.
BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD, ENGLAND
* * * * * *
Transcriber's note:
Obvious errors were corrected.
Page 46: accordng changed to according
Page 55: unbiassed changed to unbiased
Page 59: introdution changed to introduction
Page 111: efficiences changed to efficiencies
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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