Japan by the Japanese/Chapter 21.2

The revolution of Japanese industrial conditions came with the introduction of elaborate Western machinery. Branches of manufacture that had formerly been what might be termed ‘family industries’ progressed to the small shops, and from there, with the employment of large capital and with the formation of joint-stock and limited liability companies, to the factory. During the four years from 1897 to 1900 inclusive, the number of companies increased by about 87 per cent., gross capital by about 66 per cent., and paid-up capital by over 75 per cent., while the reserves increased by more than 200 per cent.

Thus, according to official returns, there were at the end of 1900 2,554 Japanese manufacturing companies employing not less than ten workpeople each, and whose aggregate financial standing was: Gross capital, £22,000,000; paid-up capital, £16,000,000; reserve, £1,800,000.

Of the foregoing companies, 1,009 were joint-stock, 1,271 limited liability, and 274 partnership and similar unlimited liability companies. The total number of workshops at the same period was 6,317, as distinct from companies. The employés of these establishments may be summed up, broadly speaking, as follows:

Those in shops using motors of various sorts:

Those in shops not using motors:

Of this number, there were in the motor-using class of shops, of children under fourteen years of age:

​Under fourteen in the shops not run by motor:

Operatives may further be divided into two classes, day workers and boarding workers, the former residing in the vicinity of the workshops, and the latter those who have come from distant places, and are provided homes and board by the employers. The majority of the latter are women. It would be difficult to say just what proportion of each of these classes predominates, but it is in the fibre works of various sorts that the boarding system most obtains, some weaving establishments having as much as 70 to 80 per cent. of boarders.

For the purpose of convenient reference, the workshops and their products may be divided into the following five sections:

1. Fibre, including raw silk, spinning, weaving, cord-making.
2. Machine shops, including machine-making, shipbuilding, furniture-making, casting.
3. Chemical workshops, including ceramics, gas, paper-mills, lacquering, leather-making, inflammable substances, artificial fertilizers, drugs, etc.
4. Miscellaneous, including breweries, sugar-refining, tobacco manufacture, tea-curing, cleaning of grains, flour, lemonade, mineral water, confectionery, preserved fruits and vegetables, printing and lithography, paper-work, wood and bamboo ware, leather-ware, feather-ware, straw-plait ware, lacquer-ware, etc.
5. Special workshops, including electricity and metallurgy.

Of the workpeople in the first section given in the foregoing sections, it is safe to say that the greater portion are female, the majority of whom are between the ages of fourteen and twenty. Those above that age constitute, perhaps, 40 per cent., with a small remainder below fourteen years, but for the most part not less than twelve.

In the second section the workpeople are mostly adult males, and where boys are employed they are seldom less than fifteen or sixteen years of age.

In the third section, and especially in glass factories, boy apprentices are employed at from twelve to thirteen years of age, and in rare instances as young as ten years. In this division, as represented by the paper-mills, not a few male and female children are employed, the youngest of whom is sometimes nine years old. This condition also obtains in tobacco manufacture.

​In printing, the majority of employés are generally adult males, sometimes with a sprinkling of children under fourteen.

In general, the working hours of operatives are twelve hours a day, although they sometimes extend to sixteen and seventeen hours. In cotton-mills the standard is twelve hours both for day and night workers, the shifts alternating every second day. In filatures the hours are from thirteen to fourteen, in power looms twelve. In hand-weaving great diversity prevails, the general rule being twelve to fifteen hours, according to season, although in some rare cases the days are as long as from sixteen to seventeen hours. In the larger shops, such as come under the second section of our classification, the working time is far more regular, averaging ten hours, with one or two hours overtime. In the third section many of the shops run steadily night and day, in which case there are two alternating shifts of twelve hours each.

Wages are calculated by the day and by piece-work, although monthly rates prevail to some extent. As a rule, accounts with labour are settled every two months, but there are still cases where pay-days are arranged half-yearly, and, more rarely still, yearly.

In the cotton-mills fully 60 per cent. of the workers are paid by the piece, and under this system, which is increasing in popularity, there is a regular fortnightly pay-day.

In a majority of shops coming under section 2 there are daily payments, modified from time to time in cases of piece-work being given out on job contract to two or more artisans.

In filature, cotton, and weaving the adult males receive about sevenpence halfpenny per day, the women about fivepence.

Machine shops and others coming under section 2 pay the ordinary worker from one shilling to one shilling and threepence per day, while to skilled artisans the rate sometimes slightly exceeds two shillings and twopence.

In match factories, on the other hand, the pay is much lower, ranging from threepence to fivepence for ordinary female operatives, and from a penny to slightly over threepence for little girls. In tobacco factories and printing-works ordinary female employés receive about fivepence, and males from tenpence to one shilling daily.

Matters relating to the control and supervision of industry were originally under jurisdiction of a Department of Industrial Affairs; but this proving unsatisfactory, there were various changes of departments, until the recent creation of a Bureau of Commerce and Manufacture, which takes direct control of all industrial matters in any way affecting the public weal. This office deals with experimental work undertaken with a ​view to improving the quality of manufactured articles, the position and structure of workshops, the control of boilers, and the employment and management of operatives and apprentices, together with their education, health, relief, etc.

Various acts have been put into operation during a period of some fifteen years, aimed at the formulation of measures or methods which might effectively prevent adulteration or debasement of national products, either raw or manufactured, and after some good and some useless experimental efforts the guild system has lately been pronounced the most effective, these organizations coming under such heads as Credit Guilds, Purchase Guilds, Sales and Protection Guilds, etc., with powers, as corporate bodies, to adopt measures aimed at furthering the business and economy of members. Rules have also been issued for the establishment of local and communal industrial experimental laboratories, or manufacturing training-schools, the objects being the encouragement and improvement of manufacture.

In 1900 the technical schools of all grades throughout the country numbered no less than 1,008, all devoted to the furthering of efficiency in manufacturing enterprise, and to adding to the technical knowledge of the people. The progress along these lines has been directed largely toward making the country independent of the assistance of foreign experts, and the success achieved is proved by the comparatively small number of European and American foremen and instructors now remaining in important or minor posts.

State aid to the extent of about £15,000 per annum is granted toward the work of providing technical teachers of Japanese birth, the principal subjects treated being, dyeing and weaving, metal and wood work, painting, designing, carving, ceramics, casting, pottery, shipbuilding, paper-making, printing, embroidery, sewing, commerce, brewing, sericulture, lacquer-work, etc.

The apprentice system has been rapidly falling into disfavour since the introduction of Western methods, and, although formerly prevailing universally in all branches of technical and manufacturing work, may now be said to exist in any semblance of its former status only in such ancient lines of business as hand-weaving, pottery, and dyeing. Some of the larger industries, such as shipbuilding, still maintain a system by which master-mechanics take under them a number of boys whom they employ at the factories or shops at which they are stationed, but the consensus of opinion is that the system is doomed, to be succeeded by regular modes of education.

In the matter of mine employés, the conditions differ from those of factory workers, because of the enormous proportion ​of unskilled labour and because of the frequent isolation of the work from the world at large. The mine workers are generally housed in buildings provided by their employers, those coming from long distances frequently settling down in the vicinity, and there making their homes and finishing their lives. Those without families live for the most part in large common rooms, and are provided with food at a low rate of cost by the mine operators.

The pay ranges from about one shilling a day for adult males to slightly over sixpence for adult females, while boys and girls are paid about fourpence halfpenny and threepence respectively. In case of accident while on duty, the employers are bound to care for the injured, and when these are treated in hospitals other than those of the mine, a sum of money must be given to meet the expense. In case of disablement compensation is paid, and in the event of death a stated amount is allowed the family for funeral expenses. In the better class of mines there are mutual aid associations, in which reserve funds are created, and to which, in addition to contributions from the workers themselves, the owners, and sometimes outside persons charitably disposed, make donations. In granting relief from such funds, the amount given is fixed, all things being equal, according to the length of time the recipient has been a member, or according to his position, or according to both these conditions.