COAL STRIKE RESULT OF OVER-PRODUCTION

"Superficially the coal strike is concerned with questions of detail as to wages, working conditions, the check-off--that is to say the closed shop--and other matters," said Professor W. Z. Ripley of the Economics Department in an interview for the CRIMSON yesterday. "But really at bottom the trouble arises as a sequence of the Great War. The abnormal prices and profits stimulated the opening up of a great number of shafts,--with a productive capacity far in excess of the normal requirements of the country. These mines naturally give employment to an abnormal number of men,--an army of employees which can supply the country with coal when working but a fraction of each week. So many men are now trying to get a living on part-time employment that the wages needed for support on this short working schedule are all out of line with the normal rates for other employments.

Labor Must be Shifted

"Something apparently has got to be done to bring about a shift of this labor away from the coal mines and into other productive industries. Any number of the poorer mines will have to be shut down indefinitely, leaving the coal supply to be drawn from the better class of properties in which, presumably, men working steadily can, at going wages, earn a fair livelihood.

"It is a great pity, of course, that this shift of industrial conditions cannot take place without the waste caused by industrial warfare. But such, nevertheless, seems to be the fact. One can only hope that the final settlement, however, will be under such a representation of the public interest as to fairly distribute the burden of accommodation all around."